Nancy Pelosi to join Debbie Wasserman Schultz for FAU town hall

Congress Still Divided As Government Shutdown Enters Third Day

Nancy Pelosi, the leader of the Democrats in the U.S. House of Representatives, returns to Florida later this week when she joins fellow Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz and others for a town hall on the recently enacted GOP tax reform plan.

The event is scheduled for Thursday, Jan. 25 at the Student Union-House Chambers on the Florida Atlantic University campus in Boca Raton.

President Donald Trump signed the $1.5 trillion rewrite of the tax code last month. It’s considered the biggest legislative victory for Trump and congressional Republicans since he took over the White House just over a year ago, and the lobbying for public opinion approval is well underway.

Recent polls suggest that more Americans are supporting the plan than when it was being debated and voted on late last year.

A Survey Monkey poll conducted for the New York Times last week shows that 46 percent of Americans now strongly or somewhat approve of the law. That’s up from 37 percent when the bill was nearing passage in December.

With unemployment continuing to drop and a strong stock market, the uptick in the economy could be a much needed boost for Republicans this November, as Trump himself continues to see his approval rating in the upper 30s.

Part of the Democratic message will be that the tax plan disproportionately benefits the wealthy at the expense of the middle class. As the statement issued for the event reads, “The town hall is the latest event on a nationwide tour to shine a light on Republican tax breaks for millionaires, billionaires and wealthy corporations at the expense of working families.”

The Tax Policy Center says that while the bill would reduce taxes on average for all income groups in both 2018 and 2019, in general higher-income households will receive larger tax cuts as a percent of after-tax income.

It goes on to say that, on average, taxes would change little for lower and middle-income groups and decrease for higher-income groups by 2027.

This will be Pelosi’s first visit to the Sunshine State since last May, when she appeared with Wasserman-Schultz and Boca Raton Democratic Rep. Ted Deutch in Wilton Manors to highlight their support for the Equality Act. It would amend the Civil Rights Act of 1964 to guarantee federal protections for LGBT individuals in education, employment, housing and other areas.

Mitch Perry

Mitch Perry has been a reporter with Extensive Enterprises since November of 2014. Previously, he served five years as political editor of the alternative newsweekly Creative Loafing. Mitch also was assistant news director with WMNF 88.5 FM in Tampa from 2000-2009, and currently hosts MidPoint, a weekly talk show, on WMNF on Thursday afternoons. He began his reporting career at KPFA radio in Berkeley and is a San Francisco native who has lived in Tampa since 2000. Mitch can be reached at [email protected].


7 comments

  • Christopher M. Kennard

    January 24, 2018 at 2:22 pm

    Yes, I understand the point that Democratic politicians are putting forward as their rallying banner cry for the next controlled national vote to take place next November of this year, and the numbers do speak for themselves . . . once again, the American people have been lied to, swindled and will long feel the dramatic losses our country and the citizenry are now set up to absorb by the politicians in Washington D. C.

    Yet I have to ask, “Which one of these very well heeled corporate politicians, Nancy or Debbie, both “powerful” Senators are not millionaires . . . .?

    Why hasn’t the Democratic Party required all Democratic Senators to return to taxpayers every cent we have paid for your gold plated health care, subsidies and other expensive perks you have received over the last decade of financial despair, desolation and debt ?

    Both major political parties play American voters as rank “suckers” for the divisive social issues and accepting the story line that we, the American people, can’t throw them out of public office and replace the vast number of party politicians who do not serve the people but rather their mega-wealthy political campaign cash and slush fund donors who pay them well to betray their country.

    The door is open to carry forward our massive movement to achieve real race and sex based parity and equality for all that has eluded our grasp for all of us who have long been involved since the days of the 1960’s Civil Rights and Peace Movement, when our country was being corrupted in the service of the war mongers who wished to eradicate all Southeast Asians during the Vietnam War era, enforced and increased racist governmental policies in America, all the while lying continuously to the American people, as is occurring today.

    Independent Senator from Vermont, Bernie Sanders, did his best the last time around in 2015-2016; now it is up to the rest of us to carry the message he spread throughout the country into becoming a vibrant, alive and powerful reality . . . a people’s peaceful “political revolution” that arises from the people themselves, state by state, and change America to being the land of free people, both united and strong and moving ahead for the mutual benefit of us all, the American people. It is time!

    I continue to fine issues of majority support, like legal cannabis and full use of “medicinal marijuana” both in Florida and throughout the country, wherever state voters support the legal cannabis civil rights movement that is sweeping across our land.

    Here, in Florida, we have a state constitutional amendment proposal for Florida voters to decide whether it should be our law, called the RIGHT OF ADULTS TO CANNABIS [Initiative Serial #15-20] that legalizes all plants of the genus, Cannabis, as well as making it completely legalizing for all adults in Florida over the age of twenty-one to possess, use and grow your own cannabis, on private property, such as your own back yard.

    This one change opens the door to reform our state criminal justice system and ending the laws making cannabis users into life-long felons who lose their vote; for full medical marijuana use; for ending the practice of controlling employees through misguided cannabis detecting pre-employment and random drug tests; and resolves the long standing practice of using cannabis laws to harass and discriminate against minority citizens or segments of the population selected for such unAmerican law enforcement policies and practices.

    Again, folks . . . it is time we take control of our country . . . we the people, ourselves.

    • William Hines

      January 27, 2018 at 5:21 pm

      Amen brother! But I feel to many people are scared, the laws have been forced in, to scare people and they have been very successful in proving the can and will Prosecute any and all that stand against them No matter what it takes!! They want us all to be sheep just like the democrats! Be quiet and do as we say or you will go to jail, but there is enough of us that are not afraid and are willing to force these people out of office, democrats or republicans and will hold the newcomers accountable or they will be removed as well. It’s time we form a new branch that oversees both parties and make them do what the majority says and the crybabies that don’t like it are free to leave this country!! I’m in and willing to use as much force as Necessary. I do not give a rat’s ass who is listing in fact I hope that both our statements make it to the desk of every elected official in this country. Sick and tired of watching them screw us out of the money we WORK HARD FOR while they sleep on the job!and get the best of everything and give illegals and worthless people that just manipulate the screwed up system OUR money when will you people get it that they work for us and we have the power to fire them. Let’s stand United, form a movement and pin our badge ‘constitution ‘ on and go guns in hand and take back what probably all our ancestors Fought and died for

  • Butch

    January 24, 2018 at 2:58 pm

    I am totally tired of the liberal narrative about everything their total attitude about anything that they can’t factually stand for it’s always either racist or misogyny or any other condemnation they can make against conservatives everything’s going great in this country now somewhat the possibility of them getting back into Power again scares the Daylights out of me they ignore the fact the 75% of the so-called dreamers are actually a financial burden on this country so the tune of somewhere between 136 billion to 140 billion annually I am including all the illegal immigrants in that statement and the simple fact that their policies are running business out of this country people stuff to start operating on a common sense perspective that no poor man gives you a job history has proven that’s a rich businessman do business in countries where their best advantages are that’s why the recent policies of this Administration has created more work and more financial prospects for the American people just common sense which in some cases with liberals is not common

    • Someone That Can Write

      January 25, 2018 at 10:07 am

      Hey, Butch. Ever hear of that thingy called a “period?”

  • Tyler Radenbaugh

    January 25, 2018 at 12:28 am

    Can someone PLEASE tell me what time this event is at? I would love to attend.

  • MMac

    January 25, 2018 at 10:00 am

    The event begins at 9:45 AM.

  • Bob

    January 26, 2018 at 7:58 am

    I observed event at FAU. No more than 30 kids in attendance. Another 30 or so Democratic hacks from the local party. Listening to Rep. Pelosi in person is scarier than seeing her on a screen.

Comments are closed.


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