In response to Donald Trump picking Kevin Hassett to lead the National Economic Council, DNC Rapid Response Director Alex Floyd released the following statement: 

“The last time Kevin Hassett had a say in our economy, he helped Donald Trump roll out a disastrous MAGAnomics tax scam that rigged the economy for the ultra-rich on the backs of hardworking Americans. Now, Trump is bringing Hassett back to enact his devastating Project 2025 plans to raise middle class taxes, hike costs, and cut programs like Social Security and Medicare — but Democrats are ready to stand up to Trump’s all-out assault against hardworking Americans’ pocketbooks.”

NEW: Donald Trump is tapping Kevin Hassett to carry out his disastrous Project 2025 economic agenda as head of the National Economic Council.

CNBC: “President-elect Donald Trump picked Kevin Hassett to lead the National Economic Council, a role that puts him at the center of the administration’s policy-making discussions from trade to taxes and deregulation.”

Hassett helped shape Trump’s MAGAnomics tax scam that rigged the economy for the ultra-wealthy and big corporations…

Washington Post: “A longtime conservative economist, Hassett helped shape the 2017 Republican tax law and has been a staunch defender of the president’s policies on other issues.”

The New York Times: “In the administration, [Hassett] has been a champion of the corporate tax cuts that Mr. Trump signed into law in late 2017 and a stalwart optimist about the economic growth those tax cuts could spur for years to come.”

CNN: “Kevin Hassett Defends Tax Cuts Amid Slowing Business Investment” 

… which didn’t cut taxes for working Americans but helped raise corporate executive salaries dramatically.

Center on Budget and Policy Priorities: “Trump Administration officials claimed their centerpiece corporate tax rate cut would ‘very conservatively’ lead to a $4,000 boost in household income. New research shows that workers who earned less than about $114,000 on average in 2016 saw ‘no change in earnings’ from the corporate tax rate cut, while top executive salaries increased sharply.  Similarly, rigorous research concluded that the tax law’s 20 percent pass-through deduction, which was skewed in favor of wealthy business owners, has largely failed to trickle down to workers in those companies who aren’t owners. Like the Bush tax cuts before it, the 2017 Trump tax cut was a trickle-down failure.” 

Just like Trump, Hassett backs cuts to Social Security and Medicare.

Judy Woodruff, PBS Newshour: “I mean you not only argue, Kevin Hassett, that belts should be tightened, you argue for much deeper cuts in entitlement programs like Social Security and Medicare in this country, and the equivalent programs in Europe.” 

Hassett: “Yeah that’s right. …”

Forbes: “Trump Floats ‘Cutting’ Spending On Entitlements Like Social Security And Medicare”

Hassett loyally champions Trump’s economic failures, despite admitting Trump’s national sales tax proposals would actually hurt American consumers.

New Yorker: “When CNN’s Poppy Harlow interviewed Hassett on Monday, she said to him, ‘You have long been this big proponent of free trade, not really a big advocate for major tariffs. Is slapping tariffs of up to twenty-five per cent on Mexico good for the U.S. economy?’ Hassett, a tax expert who advised John McCain, in 2000, and Mitt Romney, in 2012, knows perfectly well that tariffs are a form of taxation, which would hit American consumers and depress economic activity. But, rather than simply saying no to Harlow’s question, he replied, ‘What would be good for the U.S. economy would be to get the border situation under control, and it’s clear Washington is so broken that Congress isn’t going to help the President do that.’ It was only after Harlow pressed him several times that Hassett conceded the obvious, saying, ‘If we got to twenty-five per cent tariffs, there would be costs to that, for sure.’”

Washington Examiner: “Still, he saw further escalation of the China-U.S. trade war through Trump administration tariffs hurting the U.S. economy.  ‘As you get closer to the end [of the list of Chinese imports to sanction] then it hurts us too,’ said Hassett…”

Hassett has suggested slashing the corporate tax rate to zero, and called the Buffett rule – which sought to ensure the wealthiest Americans paid a fair tax rate – a “stupid rule” that was “economically illiterate.”

Hassett: “Well it’s feasible if you make me dictator which is a really good idea by the way but let me dictate this for a day. I’ll only mess with corporate [tax] code. I’ll set it to zero.” 

Bloomberg: “The Buffett rule, amongst economists, could also be called the stupid rule,’ said Kevin Hassett, a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, a Washington group that supports free enterprise. ‘It’s basically just a back-door way to hike taxes on capital.’”

Hassett: “[T]he ‘Buffett Rule’ is economically illiterate…”

Economic Policy Institute: “President Obama is again calling on Congress to implement the Buffett Rule, the principle that millionaires should not pay a smaller share of their income in taxes than what is paid by middle-class families. In short, the key element of tax fairness embodied by the Buffett Rule is that effective tax rates should rise with income. But, because high-income households often receive a large share of their income from dividends and capital gains, and because dividends and capital gains are taxed at lower rates than earned income, income tax rates actually start falling at high income levels. The Buffet Rule addresses this problem.”