Joe Biden this week pushed for the creation of American jobs as part of his economic policy agenda, but Sen. Tom Cotton Friday said in his case, "talk is cheap."
"Where was all this rhetoric for eight years of the Obama-Biden era, when our economy was stuck in neutral?" the Arkansas Republican said on Fox News' "America's Newsroom." "Why didn't they pursue those policies then, and more to the point, where was Joe Biden for his 50 years in Washington, D.C.?"
Biden, he said, is the same person who voted to send U.S. jobs to China by giving them most-favored-nation status and admitting them to the World Trade Organization. He is also someone who "has repeatedly supported failed trade deals that gave other countries the better deal and gave American workers the shaft."
Biden's plan calls for several billions of dollars in investments in research and development and manufacturing, as well as raising the federal minimum wage to $15 an hour. To pay for it, he'll raise corporate taxes and reverse President Donald Trump's tax cuts for wealthy Americans, and Cotton said that plan won't work.
"He can't win over voters with higher taxes," said Cotton. "Americans know when you increase taxes on businesses, they pass those taxes on to customers in the form of higher costs or higher fees. That's one reason why the Obama-Biden economy kept us stuck in neutral for eight years where Donald Trump helped America's workers and business, and built one of the strongest economies in modern times until China unleashed the coronavirus pandemic on the world."
Cotton also commented on former Secretary of State Colin Powell's contention that the press got "hysterical" with its coverage of reports that Russia had paid bounties to kill U.S. soldiers.
"Our senior commander on the ground in the Middle East doesn't think these reports were corroborated and he is not aware," said Cotton. "[Defense] Secretary [Mark] Esper is correct that we need to get to the bottom of who selectively leaked intelligence in this case and in so many other cases. It ought not to be happening and it's against the law."
Sandy Fitzgerald ✉
Sandy Fitzgerald has more than three decades in journalism and serves as a general assignment writer for Newsmax covering news, media, and politics.
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