Warren Is Lying About Taking ‘2 Cents’ From Billionaires To Pay For Socialist Plans. Here’s The Truth.

During Wednesday night’s fifth 2020 Democratic primary debate, hosted by MSNBC and The Washington Post, Senator Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) lied to the American people about her tax plan, misleadingly telling viewers that billionaires need to chip in “two cents” to help pay for her wildly expensive socialist policy plans.

“I have proposed a 2-cent wealth tax,” Warren said at the debate, according to NBC News. “Your first 50 billion is free and clear — but your 50 billionth and first dollar, you gotta pitch in 2 cents, and when you hit a billion dollars, you gotta pitch in a few pennies more.”

This is a lie.

Warren has actually proposed a 2% surtax on folks with a net worth over $50 million, and a 6% on people with more than $1 billion. Her initial plan included 3% tax on billionaires, before she upped it to 6%.

The Washington Post explains:

Warren’s “Ultra-Millionaire Tax” would apply to households with a net worth of $50 million or more, essentially the wealthiest 75,000 households. They would be charged 2 percent of every dollar of net worth above $50 million, unless they’re billionaires.

Households with $1 billion or more in assets would start paying 3 percent on assets above $1 billion. At least that was in Warren’s first iteration of her tax plans. She said this tax would raise $2.75 trillion over 10 years.

This is far off from what Warren said Wednesday night, and completely misleading from her actual plan.

In fact, when Warren recently promoted that “Ultra-Millionaire Tax” plan in a campaign ad, the Post gave her “Three Pinocchios” for the misleading claim.

“This video makes clear that billionaires need to pay a wealth tax. It also makes clear that a person with a gigantic fortune of over $50 million will pay 2 cents on every dollar of net worth to pay for the programs listed in the video: universal child care, universal pre-K, cancelling student loan debt, and universal free college,” Warren campaign spokeswoman Saloni Sharma said in a statement to the Post, attempting to obfuscate the lie. “We’re more than happy to talk about how other components of the wealth tax will be used to lower health care costs for millions of Americans and help pay for Medicare for All.”

However, the Post ruled their fact-check as follows:

As we said, we have a reasonable person test here. The ad — which is titled “Elizabeth Warren Stands Up to Billionaires” — does not specifically say the “two cents” would apply to billionaires, but that’s certainly the implication. In reality, Warren would charge billionaires six cents, as she and her website have made clear.

Perhaps “six cents” is not as snappy as “two cents.” But it would have been accurate. The ad as framed is highly misleading about what billionaires would pay under Warren’s various plans. She earns Three Pinocchios.

As noted by a Wall Street Journal op-ed, Warren’s tax plan targeting America’s wealthy “would sink stocks, raise interest rates, and confiscate far more than she admits.”

“Suppose a 40-year-old entrepreneur has a net worth of $525 million, the midpoint of Ms. Warren’s 2% wealth-tax bracket,” the piece outlined. “If his net worth otherwise didn’t change, an annual wealth tax of ‘just’ 2% would confiscate an amount equal to more than 50% of this value over the rest of a normal lifespan. After death, he would also pay a 40% tax on whatever remained above an $11 million exemption. Ms. Warren’s ‘just 2 cents’ combined with the death tax would add up to about 70% of the value of those assets.”