TAX NEWS - 2010

South Carolina Tax: Mulvaney calls for Spratt to take tax position, Spratt responds

Mick Mulvaney, who will face incumbent Democrat John Spratt in the Fifth Congressional District race, is challenging Spratt to take a position on tax hikes.

Mulvaney says the middle class tax cuts will expire soon, but the tax cuts of 2001 and 2003 lowered the average middle class tax bill by around $2,000 a year.

Mulvaney says Spratt has said it's not "sacrosanct" to keep the taxes low. But Mulvaney says taxes should be cut even further. He says Washington could pay for more tax relief merely by stopping deficit spending and letting the private sector expand again.

But Spratt says he supports the middle income tax cuts and says he has voted several times to remove marriage penalties in the tax code and to index the alternative minimum tax so that it doesn't apply to middle income taxpayers.

Spratt says he also voted for a 10 percent tax bracket, a $334 billion tax cut over 10 years, and for an increase in the child tax credit.  Spratt says he has always supported the earned income tax credit, which amounts to a tax cut for 50,000 working parents in his district, and has also voted to allow an estate tax exemption for well-to-do taxpayers.