Senate Majority Leader Paul Gazelka (R-Nisswa) released the following statement:
“This is the kind of budget you get when you promise everyone everything. Minnesotans do not want to pay a 48-cent per gallon gas tax, higher tab fees and motor vehicle taxes, and a tax on doctor visits just for being sick. It’s unfair, unsustainable, and sets us up for a budget deficit in the near future. With this budget, we may as well call Minnesota a cold California.”
Facts about Governor Walz’s budget proposal
- Increases state spending by nearly 9% in just one budget cycle, from $45.549 million in 2018-19 (November 2018 forecast, page 12) to 49.471 million in 2020-21 (Walz budget documents)
- Increases taxes on Minnesotans by over $3 billion:
- $1.3 billion gas tax increase
- $991 m
illion sick tax increase - $848 million tax increase through selective Minnesota tax conformity to federal law
- $74 million tax increase by clawing back bipartisan tax relief passed in 2017
- Ends permanent, bipartisan funding for roads and bridges (via sales taxes on auto parts) and replaces it by almost doubling the gas tax, a revenue source that will decline each year starting in 2020. (MnDOT Transportation Funds Forecast November 2018, page 9)