Comment: State’s wealthy want to claw back taxes they owe

By Treasure Mackley / For The Herald

Here in Washington, most of us believe in working hard, taking care of each other and our families, and leaving things better for those to come.

But as our work and innovation have made our state stronger and more prosperous, a small number of wealthy people have rigged the rules to redirect resources from our communities to their country clubs, from our classrooms to their boardrooms, and from our public parks to their private jets.

Brian Heywood is a MAGA millionaire who is bankrolling (to the tune of $6 million) six initiatives through his PAC, Let’s Go Washington. The initiatives would break down the supports we’ve built for our communities and do real harm to thousands of people across the state.

Two of the Let’s Go Washington measures relate to our tax code. As the leader of an organization that has been working to fix our upside-down tax system, advocate for fairer ways to fund the services we all rely on, and ensure that the wealthiest among us pay what they truly owe in taxes, I’m not just disappointed by these efforts, I’m outraged.

Washingtonians should see the effort for what it is: a mega-millionaire buying a permanent tax cut for himself and his friends and forcing the rest of us to pay more.

Initiative 2109 would repeal the capital gains tax, an important step legislators took in 2021 (and more than a decade in the making) to make our tax code more fair by asking the wealthiest two-tenths of a percent of Washingtonians to pay more.

In its first year, the capital gains tax brought in nearly $900 million for child care, early learning, and public schools. That funding would disappear from our kids’ future and go back into the pockets of the richest people in our state, if I-2109 passes. Millions of students — from preschoolers to high school students and those in college — will be hurt by this attempt by a few ultra-millionaires and billionaires to avoid paying what they owe.

Right now, school districts across the state are facing budget shortfalls. Administrators are forced to make choices they shouldn’t have to between beloved programs like music and theater, mental health supports, school meals and other important services that prepare our students to face their future. Simply put: Washington’s kids and families cannot afford to pay for a tax cut for a few thousand extremely wealthy individuals.

The other initiative explicitly related to taxes, I-2111, seems simple on its face: ensure a permanent tax break for the richest people in the state. But dig a little deeper and you’ll find a long list of potential unintended consequences and serious legal issues, including gutting funding for programs that Washingtonians have already paid into and denying them benefits they are entitled to.

This isn’t the first time Heywood and friends have tried to get out of paying what they owe in taxes. In 2021, they filed a lawsuit to roll back the newly passed capital gains tax. The case went all the way to the State Supreme Court, where they were overruled; the tax was deemed constitutional and valid. They tried a last-ditch Hail Mary effort to ask the U.S. Supreme Court to take up the case. Just this month, court justices declined to hear their case. Meanwhile, they’ve also made attempts to qualify a repeal of the capital gains tax via initiative with I-1929 in 2022. Lacking the political support and organization, they folded before they even started collecting signatures.

Heywood and friends refuse to pay what they owe in taxes, instead using their ample resources — spending tens of millions of dollars to date — to keep the rules rigged in their favor and telling the story that there’s not enough to go around to fund the schools and supports that our families need. I’m not a millionaire, but I’m not buying it. You shouldn’t either.

The Let’s Go Washington initiatives are far out of alignment with our shared values.

I can see right through these self-serving measures, and I think Washington voters will, too. Voters strongly support making the rich pay what they owe our communities and they will reject this greedy money grab.

A recent poll found only 31 percent of voters say they support a repeal of the capital gains tax. That’s consistent with poll after poll, where voters nationwide say they want the super-rich to pay their fair share of taxes, according to polling by Impact Research). Washingtonians have long said they support the capital gains tax of 7 percent on stock market profits greater than $250,000.

I won’t let one self-interested millionaire unravel the progress we’ve made to build a fairer tax code. I hope you’ll show up with your November ballot to demand that everyone pays what they truly owe in taxes, even when they spend millions trying to get out of it.

Treasurer Mackley is executive director of Invest in Washimgton Now.