August 7 was a big day for Senator Raphael Warnock (D – Georgia). In just 12 hours, he gave the middle finger to middle-class taxpayers, hugged illegal aliens, and high-fived the IRS.
Warnock did all of this while the Senate considered Joe Biden’s deceptively titled, 273-page Inflation Reduction Act (IRA). Warnock’s votes should appall every Georgian.
While his constituents slept, Warnock torpedoed their best interests.
The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) forecasts that the IRA will ease inflation by 0.1 percent, maximum. A startling cost for this subliminal benefit is Biden’s scheme to hire 86,852 new IRS agents – more than double the number needed to fill the Atlanta Braves’ Truist Park. These new revenuers would swell the tax bureaucracy from 93,654 employees to 180,506 — up 92.7%. The expanded IRS could launch a new Georgia town halfway in population between Augusta and Macon.
Senate Republicans tried valiantly to kill or curb Biden’s boondoggle.
●First, Senator Mike Crapo (R - Idaho) tried to guard non-millionaire taxpayers from these new agents. According to Congress.gov, Crapo’s amendment aimed to “prevent the use of additional Internal Revenue Service Funds from being used for audits of taxpayers with taxable incomes below $400,000 in order to protect low- and middle-income earning American taxpayers...”
The Congressional Joint Economic Committee calculated that unleashing these new tax collectors, not on Elon Musk or Mark Zuckerberg, but on nurses, plumbers, and teachers, through 2031, would squeeze $30.2 billion from Americans who earn less than $200,000 annually.
Every Senate Republican voted Yea on Crapo’s plan to shield hard-working taxpayers from federal audits.
However, Warnock refused to isolate IRS auditors from everyday Georgians, whose per capita personal incomes last year equaled a far more modest $55,786. So, at 2:54 a.m., he joined every other Senate Democrat, voted Nay, and unanimously killed Senator Crapo’s amendment.
But Warnock just was getting started.
●Second, Senator Rick Scott (R –Florida) offered a modest proposal: To get the 87,000 new IRS agents whom Biden Democrats crave, they first must authorize 18,000 brand-new Border Patrol officers. Every Senate Republican voted Yea.
This vote should have been easy for Warnock. The U.S.-Mexico frontier is in total meltdown, 3,817,180 illegal aliens invaded the southwestern “border” in Biden’s first 20 months (up 362% versus President Donald J. Trump’s final 20 months), and fentanyl – mainly smuggled in from Mexico – killed 71,238 Americans in 2021, per CDC.
So what?
At 3:17 a.m., Warnock joined all other Senate Democrats, voted Nay, and killed Senator Scott’s amendment.
●Next, Warnock could have kept the IRA and spared Americans the price and pain of these new taxocrats. Senator Ted Cruz (R - Texas) sponsored an amendment: “To strike the $80,000,000,000 slush fund for the Internal Revenue Service to prevent the hiring of 87,000 new Internal Revenue Service employees that will surveil and audit the private account information and transaction data of innocent Americans and small businesses.”
At 8:13 a.m., every Senate Republican voted Yea. Warnock and the entire Democrat conference voted Nay and killed Cruz’s amendment.
●Warnock then introduced his own amendment: “To make health care coverage available to low-income adults in States that have not expanded Medicaid.” At 8:40 a.m., to Warnock’s eternal credit, he united Democrats and Republicans in a stunning show of bipartisanship. Members of both parties overwhelmingly laughed his proposal off of the Senate floor. It flopped, big league, 5 Yeas to 94 Nays. Forty-five Democrats – including liberal war horses Schumer, Patty Murray of Washington, and Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts – joined every Republican but Susan Collins of Maine in catapulting Warnock’s brilliant measure onto the ash heap of history.
●After this long night’s journey into day, the IRA and its $739 billion in new taxes, $433 billion in New Green Deal giveaways, and -- of course -- 87,000 new IRS agents approached the finish line. At 3:04 p.m., all Senate Republicans voted Nay. Warnock and all other Democrats voted Yea. Vice President Kamala Harris broke the 50-50 tie, and the IRA squeaked through the Senate. The House concurred on August 12, and Biden signed this leviathan into law on August 16.
The IRA, in all its pestilence, is coming soon to a bank account near you.
To recap: Warnock and every single Senate Democrat picked Americans’ pockets, sicced tax enforcers on them, and kept them vulnerable to trans-“border” dangers. They did this on August 7, while voters baked on beaches and strolled through amusement parks.
Tuesday will be a huge day for Georgians, as they decide the runoff between Warnock and Republican Herschel Walker. Everyone outraged by these legislative betrayals should vote Nay on Raphael Warnock.
Manhattan-based political commentor Deroy Murdock is a Fox News Contributor.