Washington Post fact-checker Glenn Kessler on Wednesday gave a claim from former Vice President Joe BidenJoe BidenHillicon Valley: Biden calls on Facebook to change political speech rules | Dems demand hearings after Georgia election chaos | Microsoft stops selling facial recognition tech to police Trump finalizing executive order calling on police to use ‘force with compassion’ The Hill’s Campaign Report: Biden campaign goes on offensive against Facebook MORE about President TrumpDonald John TrumpSenate advances public lands bill in late-night vote Warren, Democrats urge Trump to back down from veto threat over changing Confederate-named bases Esper orders ‘After Action Review’ of National Guard’s role in protests MORE’s tax cuts four Pinocchios.
The remark in question from Biden was made at a rally earlier this week in Pittsburgh, Pa., for his recently announced 2020 White House bid.
“There’s a $2 trillion tax cut last year,” Biden said. “Did you feel it? Did you get anything from it? Of course not. Of course not. All of it went to folks at the top and corporations.”
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Kessler focused on the second part of that statement, that no one but the rich benefitted from the tax cut.
“That’s simply wrong,” Kessler wrote.
“As we have explained before, any broad-based tax cut is going to mostly benefit the wealthy because they already pay a large share of income taxes.”
“If the wealthy end up with more money because they pay more in taxes, that’s not necessarily a fair way to look at tax legislation,” he added later.
The fact-checker noted that “when both the Joint Tax Committee and the Tax Policy Center looked at the impact of the tax bill, they concluded that in 2018, most people would see an overall reduction in taxes.”
“Biden, with his loose language, ends up in the Four-Pinocchio territory. He asserts that no Americans but those at the top received any tax cut in 2018, which is clearly false. Most Americans received a tax cut. They may not have noticed it, but that’s no excuse for saying they never got one,” he concluded.
A four-Pinocchio rating was the most egregious that one can receive from the Post fact-checker until Kessler introduced a “bottomless Pinocchio” rating last year.
Biden’s campaign did not immediately respond to a request for comment on The Post’s rating.
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