Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders (R-AR) signs new tax cuts into law, and answers questions about an abortion-related amendment.
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NewsTranscript
00:00by both of you and our leadership.
00:03I also want to thank Senator Dismang and Representative Eves for their leadership on this session's
00:07tax cuts, and to Senator Crowell and Representative Schultz for helping us grow our homestead
00:13tax credit.
00:14And of course, a huge thank you to the bipartisan group of legislators that are here today for
00:20their support of these pro-growth, pro-business, pro-family tax cuts.
00:27Half a billion dollars is how much money we just put back into the pockets of the people
00:32of Arkansas.
00:33That is a great day for our state.
00:45Our income tax is now 3.9 percent.
00:50And of the southern states that levy an income tax, Arkansas now has the lowest in the region.
00:581.1 million is how many Arkansans will have more money in their paychecks thanks to this legislation.
01:13We also expanded the homestead tax credit by 46 million dollars and funded our Arkansas
01:19game and fish, helping our state's outdoor economy continue to grow and serve Arkansans
01:26and visitors across Arkansas.
01:30Arkansans are looking at Washington and seeing nothing but failure.
01:34Prices have risen 20 percent since President Biden took office, and they have lit trillions
01:39of taxpayer dollars on fire.
01:42Today they can look at Little Rock and get some of their economic confidence back.
01:47We've cut taxes three times in the past 18 months.
01:52At the same time, we have balanced our budget and grew spending this past year by only 1.76
01:59percent, far below the 3 percent average.
02:03These are the numbers, but I want to talk a little bit about what these tax cuts actually
02:09look like on the ground.
02:11Imagine a family of four, where both parents are just starting out as teachers in Arkansas.
02:18Thanks to Arkansas Learns, they now each earn $50,000.
02:23And thanks to the tax cuts, they will take home $954 more a year.
02:31With household staples like milk, eggs, and bread up over double digits the past three
02:36years, these savings are more important than ever before.
02:41I remember visiting a steel mill in Blytheville late last year, part of the group of factories
02:46that have made Mississippi County, Arkansas, the top steel-producing county in all of
02:52the United States.
02:54The jobs there are tough, but the workers I met loved what they were doing.
02:59A big part of that was the salary.
03:02A lot of those guys were earning six figures just a few years out of high school.
03:07The problem?
03:08A lot of them didn't actually live in Arkansas.
03:11They were coming from Tennessee, Missouri, and even as far away as Kentucky, and spending
03:17part of their week in Arkansas, and then heading back to their homes for their time off.
03:23I asked them why.
03:25After all, it would be great for that area to have hundreds of new residents, and great
03:29for our state to have hundreds of new taxpayers.
03:33The answers ranged, but one of the common themes that they kept coming back to were
03:38taxes.
03:39Before I took office, the state would have taken well over $1,000 more out of their paychecks
03:45each year.
03:46Now, we are not only competing for these workers, we are winning them, and they are relocating
03:52to our state.
03:54We're not quite at Tennessee and Texas levels yet, but we are moving in the right direction,
04:00and we are doing so responsibly.
04:02We're already lower than all the other states that border us, and as our tax rates shrink,
04:08everything else is growing.
04:10Our population, our labor force, and our economy as a whole.
04:15We've marked record highs on all of these fronts since I took office.
04:20These achievements don't happen by mistake.
04:23It takes everyone that is standing here working together to keep government spending at a
04:28minimum while still investing in our key priorities, like education, public safety, outdoor recreation,
04:37and delivering savings to taxpayers.
04:40And with those savings, Arkansans now have the breathing room they need to help with
04:45their mortgage, their car payment, their grocery bills, or anything else that's been keeping
04:50their families up at night.
04:52I want to once again thank our legislators for their incredibly hard work, not just over
04:58the past week, but over the past year and a half.
05:02Their continued commitment to saving Arkansans money, it shows, and it's working.
05:10I'll now turn it over to a few of them for remarks, and then we'll come back up and take
05:13a couple of questions.
05:15Thank you so much, and congratulations to the state of Arkansas on this great week.
05:27Thank you, Governor, and thank you for your leadership.
05:30I want to thank my colleagues in the House and Senate, Pro Tem Hester, and all those
05:36that have worked on this.
05:38Once again, the legislature answered the call, and we were called in to do a job in this
05:42special session, and we've accomplished it.
05:45We've accomplished it in three days.
05:47You know, I look back on my time here in the House and going back to 2011, and I recall
05:52back then, we cut a little bit.
05:54We had a few things that provided some exemptions and other things, and we had to fight tooth
05:59and nail just to have a few million dollars of savings to return to Arkansans, and here
06:04we are many years later under the leadership of Governor Sanders, and we're now down to
06:093.9 percent as far as the top rate when it comes to income tax.
06:13I think that this is always something that we've talked about.
06:16I'm very proud that we've been able to accomplish it.
06:19I believe there's still more work to be done, but I'm confident with Governor Sanders' leadership
06:23and with the hard work of the House and the Senate that we can continue to move Arkansas
06:28forward.
06:29I think that when you look at these things with regard to the income tax reduction or
06:33the increase in the homestead exemption, you know, the most important thing is that it
06:39benefits the people of Arkansas, and that's who we're here to serve, and once again, we've
06:43been able to allow them to keep more of their hard-earned money because they know how best
06:48to spend that money to benefit their families, and so I'm excited about that.
06:51Thank you again, Governor, and look forward to once again having an additional tax cut
06:56bill signed.
06:57Thank you.
06:58Thank you.
07:04With that, we'll take a couple questions, if there are any.
07:07So, on Game and Fish, this came up in the fiscal session.
07:12Was there a way that you could have stepped up in the fiscal session and resolved some
07:16of the arguments that were going on in the House, or would it have to call a special session?
07:21Look, I'm proud of the fact that we were able to get Arkansas Game and Fish fully funded.
07:26It's a critical agency in state government.
07:30We're proud of the work they do.
07:32I'm also glad that we were able to combine that and pass significant tax cuts so that
07:38all Arkansans are doing better, particularly during this difficult time.
07:42I have two questions.
07:44First, for the tax cuts, for people making less than $25,000 a year, is there anything
07:49more that we can do for that group of people?
07:51And then also, you did mention this, but this has to be on the House floor when they
07:55pass the resolutions to not support the abortion amendment.
07:59Where do you stand on how to vote?
08:00Because I've heard the argument made that it should not be up to legislators to tell
08:03voters how to vote on that.
08:05It should be up to voters, but it's going to be on the ballot.
08:07So, aside from a pro-life, pro-choice argument, where do you stand on that?
08:11Look, I'm never going to apologize for being pro-life.
08:15Arkansas is the most pro-life state in the country.
08:18I'm proud of that fact.
08:19I think we need to continue to look for every opportunity we can to solidify our position there.
08:24On the first question about the taxes, every individual making over $25,000 will receive
08:31a tax cut, and their rate will be moved to 3.9%.
08:35Anybody making less than $25,000 is already paying a lower tax rate at 3.4%.
08:42This will impact 1.1 million Arkansans.
08:45Our goal should never be to look at the minimum, but how do we move those people in that bottom
08:49area to make more money?
08:51That's why we focus so much on education, workforce development, and we're going to
08:56continue to look to responsibly phase out the state income tax as a whole.
09:01Applause
09:08Feel free to jump in.
09:09What does the next round of taxes look like?
09:11Is there another special session or is there a regular session?
09:14We don't have any plans for a special session at this point, but as long as Arkansas' economy
09:20continues to grow, we'll continue to look for opportunities to phase our state income tax down.
09:25What that looks like, I'm not going to get ahead of any potential legislation that would come
09:30between a lot of conversations between the people in this room and our team and making
09:36sure Arkansas' economy continues to stay strong.
09:39Great.
09:40Thank you all so much.
09:41Appreciate you being here.
09:42Applause
09:55Thank you.
10:25Applause
10:55Applause
11:25Applause