A lot of events have unfolded over the past few days in the US political circuit. Kevin McCarthy has been elected as the House Speaker via a historic post-midnight ballot on Saturday. He managed to overcome resistance from his own ranks. Evidently, Republicans roared in celebration when his victory was announced.
Now, in another development that unraveled late Monday, the US House passed a bill to slash funding for 87,000 new IRS agents.
Republicans Vote To Strip Billions From The IRS
This is one of the first legislative moves of the House Republicans, the party in the majority. The measure would cut billions in funding that the Democrats passed to tackle tax cheats.
On Monday, House Republicans voted to detain ~$71 billion from the IRS. Notably, the Democrats stipulated roughly $80 billion for the same department last year. The funds included more than $45 billion for enforcement because party lawmakers hoped to authorize the IRS, to find and collect unpaid federal taxes from high-earning individuals and businesses.
After unanimously opposing the Inflation Reduction Act, the Republicans shifted their focus to spending last year. They swiftly transformed that into an election-year weapon and accused the Democrats of trying to interfere with innocent Americans’ finances.
While gavelling the first vote on legislation under his leadership, McCarthy exclaimed, “Promises made.”
Party leaders are already calling for expenditure cuts in exchange for their votes around critical deadlines. Rep. Jason T. Smith pledged in a statement,
“Our first step is defunding the $80 billion pay increase Democrats gave the IRS to hire 87,000 new agents to target working families. But we are not stopping there.”
He added that he planned to force Daniel Werfel, the president’s newly nominated IRS commissioner, to spend a lot of time before their committee.
Later, on the House floor, Smith said Republicans are “ready to provide oversight and accountability, and that starts today.”