The Greene County Democrat

Tag: Cory Booker

  • Cory Booker Unveils ‘Keep Your Pay Act’ To Make First $75K Of Income Tax-Free

    Cory Booker Unveils ‘Keep Your Pay Act’ To Make First $75K Of Income Tax-Free

    by Shannon Dawson, NewsOne

    New Jersey Senator Cory Booker has announced a new tax proposal called the Keep Your Pay Act, which he introduced in the Senate on March 9. If passed, the bill would be a game changer for Americans, helping citizens to keep their hard earned cash in their pockets come tax season. 

    The Keep Your Pay Act argues for no federal income tax for the first $75,000 in income. 

    According to a press release, at the centerpiece of the plan is a straightforward idea: the first $75,000 of income would be tax-free for households filing jointly, with proportional tax relief for single filers and heads of household. Booker’s proposal would more than double the standard deduction for taxpayers.

    Under current guidelines from the Internal Revenue Service, the standard deduction for 2025 is $15,750 for single filers or those married filing separately, $31,500 for married couples filing jointly or a qualifying surviving spouse, and $23,625 for heads of household. 

    If Booker’s proposal were enacted, many married taxpayers would pay no federal income tax on the first $75,000 they earn. According to NBC News, individual (Single) filers would receive a standard deduction of $37,500 while head of household would receive a standard deduction of $56,250 under the legislation.

    The Child Tax Credit would expand under the bill if passed.

    The Keep Your Pay Act would also expand the Child Tax Credit through the American Family Act. Under the plan, the credit would increase to $3,600 per child ages 6 to 17 and $4,320 for children under six. It would also include a $2,400 “baby bonus” in the year a child is born to help families cover the high upfront costs of welcoming a newborn. The credit would be fully refundable so that families with lower incomes can still receive the full benefit.

    It would also boost age eligibility for the Earned Income Tax Credit.

    In addition, the plan would expand the Earned Income Tax Credit through the Tax Cut for Workers Act. The measure would extend eligibility to younger workers ages 19 to 24 and older workers 65 and above—groups that are currently excluded from receiving the full benefit—while also tripling the value of the credit to deliver additional relief to workers without children in the home.

    Booker says the proposal would be fully paid for by closing tax loopholes used by wealthy individuals and large corporations and requiring them to pay a larger share. Measures could include raising the corporate tax rate, strengthening corporate tax rules, increasing taxes on stock buybacks, tightening limits on deductions for executive compensation, and addressing other tax avoidance strategies.

    “The tax system is rigged, we all know this,” Booker told supporters in a video shared to his X account on March 9. “It’s rigged against working people and all full with things that help people with a lot of money—whether it’s corporations or billionaires—avoid paying taxes.”

    Why is Cory Booker proposing this?

    The plan is designed as a sweeping response to a range of economic concerns, including rising costs and wages that have struggled to keep pace with essentials such as housing and health care.

    “You should keep more of your money,” Booker added in his video shared Tuesday, March 2.

  • Selma Bridge Crossing Jubilee attended by thousands; Pushes theme of “Lift Our Vote 2020-Voting Rights Under Fire”

    Before the re-enactment of the 1965 Blood Sunday March, 400 marchers in orange vests lay down on the Edmund Pettus Bridge for 400 seconds to commemorate the 400th anniversary of importation and enslavement of African people in Jamestown, Virginia in 1619. When the protestors stood up they each had a Manifesto to end voter suppression and reclaim voting rights in their hands.

    By: John Zippert, Co-Publisher
    Despite stormy weather, thousands attended the Bridge Crossing Jubilee, this past weekend in Selma, Alabama. Part a commemoration of the 54th anniversary of the March 7, 1965 “Bloody Sunday March for Voting Rights”; part a celebration of civil and voting progress in our nation; and part a recommitment to social change activism to correct voter suppression and bring more equity and dignity to the struggle for human rights in America.
    The Jubilee was a combination of more than 40 events including workshops, a parade, a golf tournament; a unity breakfast, several award presentations, the “Foot Soldiers breakfast”, a beauty pageant, a mock trial, the “Freedom Flame dinner”, and the March re-enactment on Sunday afternoon.
    Former Alabama State Senator Hank Sanders said at the opening Mass Meeting, at Tabernacle Baptist Church, on Thursday night, “the Selma Bridge Crossing Jubilee is the largest civil rights gathering in the nation, dedicated to furthering voting rights and human rights for people in our country and around the world.”
    Sanders recalled that over 80,000 people attended the 50th anniversary celebration on Saturday in 2015, when President Obama attended and 110,000 people came to march that Sunday.
    Attorney Faya Rose Toure (Sanders) who coordinates the Bridge Crossing Jubilee, said, “ We want to celebrate the courage of the people in the 1960’s who led the voting rights movement from Selma, but we must also recognize the current day’s rampant voter suppression in this country and the fact that Selma is the ninth poorest city in America with a high rate of crime and homicides.”

    Faya Rose also pointed out that 2019 is the 400th anniversary of the enslavement of African people in north America, with the importation of twenty Black workers to the British colony at Jamestown, Virginia in 1619. There was an event where 400 people lay down on the Edmund Pettus Bridge for 400 seconds to commemorate this anniversary. The lay-in was delayed by bad weather and a tornado warning but did take place before the larger crowd of thousands re-enacted the 1965 Bloody Sunday Voting Rights March. “We were beaten on the bridge in 1965 but we are lying down in 2019 and rising up to end voter suppression and lifting our voices and votes to change oppressive conditions for all people,” said Faya Rose Toure.
    A highlight of the Jubilee was Sunday morning’s Unity Breakfast held at Wallace Community College in Selma. More than a thousand people attended to witness Hillary Clinton receive the International Unity Award, as well as to meet and listen to several Presidential candidates including Cory Booker, Bernie Sanders and Sherrod Brown. The breakfast also heard greetings from civil rights leaders like Rev. Jesse Jackson, Rev. William Barber, Charles Steele and other local leaders like newly elected State Senator Malika Sanders Fortier and Congresswomen Terri Sewell.
    In presenting the International Unity Award to former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, Hank Sanders said, “Secretary Clinton was elected President in 2016, but the election was stolen from her by the FBI reporting on her emails, the Russians hacking into the Democratic Party and sending false messages on social media. She deserves this award for standing up for women’s rights and human rights across the globe.”
    Faya Rose Toure inducted Hillary Clinton into the Women’s Hall of Fame at the National Voting Rights Museum.
    In her remarks, in accepting the awards, Clinton said, “ I am honored and humbled to receive these awards for my work for women, voting and human rights. But we have urgent unfinished work to protect fundamental rights, freedom of the press, and ending voter suppression. There is a crisis in this country and it is up to us to address it.”
    “We must show up and vote every time in every election. We must di this step by step, year by year, door by door, to reclaim our democracy,” said Clinton.
    In his remarks, Rev. Jesse Jackson of the Rainbow/PUSH Coalition said, “ I must express my thanks to Faya Rose and Hank Sanders for keeping this Bridge Crossing Jubilee going year after year and to the people of Selma, the birthplace of modern democracy in America. Since the 2018 elections, we have 55 Black Congress-people, 38 Latino and Latinas, 20 Asian Americans and over 100 women. All of these people, and many more state and local public officials, owe their positions to the voting rights struggle in Selma in 1965. But Selma is still suffering with a 40% poverty rate. We need to push the government for a ’rural reconstruction plan and project in Selma and surrounding counties of the Alabama Black Belt’, just like we rebuild Europe with the Marshall Plan after World War II,” said Rev. Jackson.