Kamala Harris’s economic advisor appeared on CNBC to tout the Democrat presidential nominee’s radical tax plan to the American people, but the move severely backfired.
Bharat Rama appeared on CNBC’s Squawk Box but ended up being humiliated by the show’s hosts.
While appearing on a network that’s supposedly friendly to the Harris campaign, Rama tried to sell the vice president’s Communist-style tax plan.
Rama sought to convince the audience that a key portion of his boss’s socialist $5 trillion tax plan “provides opportunity” for Americans.
He attempted to explain to the hosts that taxing unrealized gains was fair, only applied to a small number of rich people, and was similar to a property tax.
However, Harris’s tax scheme includes a new minimum tax of 25 percent on traditional income and unrealized capital gains for taxpayers with more than $100 million in total wealth.
While supposedly just targeted at the rich, such a tax would create widespread economic damage.
Economists warn that the plan is unworkable and blatantly unconstitutional.
However, the show’s hosts Becky Quick and Joe Kernan understand these facts.
They easily exposed Rama’s economic ignorance and took him to school.
They ended up shredding Rama live on air and laughing while making fun of him.
WATCH:
TRANSCRIPT:
QUICK: Taxing unrealized gains just doesn’t seem fair in any sense of the word.
In the very best sense, if you were taxing unrealized gains, all you are doing is pulling forward the taxes that would be paid later when somebody actually sells the stock.
RAMA: I, I, I, think this reaction to taxing unrealized gains is a little funny given that I bet the majority of the people watching right now are already paying a tax on unrealized gains.
It’s called a property tax.
KERNAN (derisively): Property tax. That’s an old trope.
RAMA: When the value of your home goes up, you pay higher taxes.
QUICK: The value of your home never moves the way your stock moves…
KERNAN (mocking Rama while agreeing with Quick): It’s not the same. That’s (Rama’s comment) always the go-to answer (from liberals).
QUICK (continuing): The property tax is a use tax.
You’re paying for the schools, you’re paying for emergency services…Those are things that make absolute sense.
RAMA: Sure. And all of the revenue that comes from these unrealized gains, taxes, and the other taxes in the Harris plan is going to go to what she calls more opportunity…
QUICK: But it’s not actually people who are using the services.
RAMA: Look, you are arguing that this is some sort of foreign concept that’s completely unknown…
KERNAN: It’s probably unconstitutional…
QUICK: It’s not income.
KERNAN: And it’s never going to happen…Not in my, well, not in my lifetime (laughing at Rama)…Not in Becky’s lifetime!
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