Mark Warner on Tax Reform Democratic VA Governor

Pushed $1.4B tax increase to close $6B budget shortfall

Warner countered that the tax increase was needed to close a $6 billion budget shortfall that he said he inherited from Gilmore. Gilmore said he left office with a balanced budget. Gilmore said Warner’s tax increase did little to help road-building, and they were proof that Warner would support higher federal taxes as well. “Taxes are coming at us like a freight train,” Gilmore said. Gilmore was referring to Obama’s proposal to roll back Bush’s tax cuts on the wealthiest Americans. Warner said he supports eliminating those tax cuts as a way of reducing the federal deficit.

Roll back top-tier tax breaks

Warner said he has expressed support only for rolling back top-tier tax breaks by the Bush administration and is against tax increases on small businesses.

Vetoed offshore drilling ban until more laws & facts known

REALITY: The update to the Joint Finance Committee letters are public, e-mailed to all General Assembly members, and posted on the web just after the Governor receives it. The monthly revenue reports also are widely reported by the media

Gilmore promised car tax repeal at $620M; but it cost $2B

REALITY: While running for governor in 1997, Gilmore promised Virginia voters that his car tax repeal would cost no more than $620 million and would not require any cuts in core services. By the time Gilmore left, he cut millions from necessary programs and the car tax repeal was creating a nearly $2 billion hole in Virginia’s budget. [AP, 4/30/04

2003 tax package raised some taxes & removed low-income tax

The proposal raised some taxes, including Virginia’s lowest-in-the-nation cigarette tax and income taxes on the very highest wage earners. It included a modest increase in the state sales tax, even as it cut the sales tax on food by 1.5 cents and removed 140,000 lower-income Virginians from the tax rolls altogether.

Cut taxes for at least 65% of Virginians