The fourth ad from Vermonters First picks up on a statement Speaker of the House Shap Smith made last May.
The ad, which began airing today, features a barber, an auto mechanic, a carpenter, and a designer cautioning viewers that some Democrats support a sales tax on services and that this tax would “kill jobs” and “make life a whole lot more expensive for everybody.” It concludes with the now familiar refrain, “Democrats in control are out of control.”
Vermont Democratic Party Chair Jake Perkinson promptly released the following statement in response: “Vermonters First’s latest ad is based on as much fact as Tayt Brooks’ answer when asked if he’s seen Randy Brock lately. Vermont Democratic Leadership never put forward a bill to expand taxes in this way. Maybe millionaire Lenore Broughton should invest her money more wisely in a credible researcher, not someone using out-of-state strategies who can’t get the facts right.”
In a press release announcing the ad, Vermonters First drew upon two statements as evidence of Democratic support for expanding the sales tax to include services.
The first was a VTDigger story about a joint press conference held last spring by Smith and Senate President Pro Tem John Campbell in which Smith announced, among other things, that “he wants to lower the sales tax to a nominal amount, from 6 percent to a much lower amount suggested by the Blue Ribbon Tax Structure Commission (between 1 percent and 2 percent) and expand the assessment to services.”
The second was Gov. Shumlin’s response to a question during the first gubernatorial debate of the season regarding the options for financing health care.
The debate host, VPR’s Bob Kinzel, said to Shumlin: “You’ve got the income tax. You’ve got the sales tax. Perhaps an expansion of the sales tax. Maybe a new tax on junk food. Tell us now tonight, what are the options that you are looking at?”
Shumlin responded, “The options we all know are all the options you just laid out, plus premiums, which is what we use right now.”
Though the evidence is scanty that Shumlin supports the measure, the Blue Ribbon Tax Study Committee has recently resumed a study examining the option of a sales tax on services .
Vermonters First Treasurer Tayt Brooks declined to reveal how much airtime was purchased for this ad nor would he discuss whether or not there are other ads in the queue.
“We’ll see what transpires between now and the election,” Brooks said.
He also declined to disclose how much the Super PAC spent on its recent mailing or how many people have received their letters and absentee ballot applications except to say, “we did the mailing throughout the entire state of Vermont.”
The ad can be viewed on YouTube.
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Editor’s note: The headline for this story was revised for accuracy at 8:35 a.m. on Oct. 2.
Read the story on VTDigger here: Vermonters First ad points up Democratic Speaker’s support of sales tax on services.