Harris leans into populism with proposal for middle-class and lower-income tax relief

Vice President Kamala Harris on Friday unveiled a populist economic agenda, proposing a new plan to cut taxes for more than 100 million middle-class and lower-income Americans as she builds out the details of her governing agenda weeks after locking down the Democratic presidential nomination.

The vice president proposed her economic platform — which include measures aimed at making housing, groceries, health care and raising children more affordable — in a speech in battleground North Carolina. It comes as her Republican rival, former President Donald Trump, seeks to pin blame on Harris for inflation since she and President Joe Biden took office.

Harris’ proposals largely build on Biden’s economic platform, reviving or extending temporary measures that congressional Democrats enacted in major packages when the party controlled Congress during the first two years of Biden’s term.

Harris said she would “build on the foundations” of economic progress made by the Biden administration.

“Still, we know that many Americans don’t yet feel that progress in their daily lives. Costs are still too high, and on a deeper level, for many people, no matter how much they work, it feels so hard just to be able to get ahead,” she said.

She said a “defining goal of her presidency” would be to build what she called an “opportunity economy” for the middle class. She also vowed to rein in the rising prices of goods like groceries and take on price gouging.

“As president, I will take on the high costs that matter most to most Americans,” she said. “I know most businesses are creating jobs, contributing to our economy and playing by the rules. But some are not, and that’s just not right, and we need to take action when that is the case.”

Before his departure from the 2024 race last month, Biden struggled to articulate and defend his economic record. Harris is seeking to sell an amped-up series of progressive proposals with a more forward-looking message — one that pledges to strengthen the middle class and take on big businesses that she says bear the blame for rising costs.

The Democratic nominee’s release of her economic agenda comes days before Democrats gather in Chicago for the party’s convention, where they will seek to draw contrasts between Harris’ vision and Trump’s economic record.

Harris on Friday took aim at Trump’s economic proposals — particularly his calls for 10% to 20% tariffs on imported goods, costs that experts say companies would pass on to consumers by raising prices.

The vice president said Trump’s proposals would “devastate the middle class, punish working people and make the cost of living go up for millions of Americans.”

“He wants to impose what is in effect a national sales tax on everyday products and basic necessities that we import from other countries. That will devastate Americans. It will mean higher prices on just about every one of your daily needs. A Trump tax on gas. A Trump tax on food. A Trump tax on clothing. A Trump tax on over-the-counter medication,” Harris said. “At this moment when prices are too high, he would make them even higher.”

Harris’ new proposals would require congressional approval – and she has not specified how she’d pay for her costly wish list at a time when the federal debt is swiftly rising. Those details will come later, people familiar with the matter tell CNN, as Harris’ team plans a series of rollouts on economic policies centered on specific themes.

Harris’ plan would restore the American Rescue Plan’s popular expansion of the child tax credit to as much as $3,600, up from $2,000, and call for it to be made permanent. The enhancement was only in effect in 2021. Biden and Democratic leaders on Capitol Hill have been unsuccessful in their efforts to partially revive it – in part because of its hefty price tag. A bipartisan bill that would have temporarily beefed up the child tax credit passed the House earlier this year but was blocked by Republicans in the Senate.

The proposal would also add a new child tax credit of up to $6,000 for middle-class and lower-income families with children in their first year of life. That’s when a family’s expenses, such as cribs, diapers and car seats, can be at their highest and when many parents have to take time off from their jobs, the campaign noted.

Harris’ economic policy would also expand the earned income tax credit, known as the EITC, to offer frontline workers without dependent children a tax reduction of up to $1,500. The American Rescue Plan enhanced the maximum credit, which is available to workers in lower-income jobs, to roughly that amount, but the enhancement to the EITC was only in effect for 2021.

The vice president’s package calls for extending the more generous Affordable Care Act premium subsidies that are set to expire at the end of 2025. The enhancement, which was made available through the American Rescue Plan and extended by the Inflation Reduction Act, has helped push sign-ups for Obamacare coverage to record levels.

Harris’ proposed plan does not specify how long these costly provisions would be in effect.

Her broader economic policy will include a four-year plan to lower housing costs, including $25,000 in down payment assistance for first-time homeowners and actions aimed at spurring the construction of new housing, including tax incentives for building starter homes. She is also expected to call for a federal ban on price gouging to lower grocery prices and everyday costs.

Harris’ tax cuts proposal comes as she faces constant attacks from the Trump campaign, particularly the GOP vice presidential nominee, JD Vance, for being anti-family. Vance told CBS News over the weekend that he wants to increase the child tax credit to $5,000 per child. Former President Donald Trump’s Tax Cuts and Jobs Act of 2017 doubled the child tax credit to the current $2,000 – though that enhancement is set to expire at the end of next year, along with the law’s other individual income tax provisions.

The Harris campaign argued against Trump’s economic agenda as it seeks to draw a stark contrast, arguing he is “running on a promise to give another billionaire tax break to his ultra-wealthy friends.” The former president’s plan, according to the campaign, “will give billionaires a tax handout of $3.5 million apiece each year, give big corporations a $1.5 trillion windfall, and make it easier for wealthy tax cheats to avoid paying what they own.”