Concerned citizens who descended on Harrisburg for Tuesday’s all-day Pennsylvania State Capitol Taxpayers’ Protest were welcomed by a united no tax increase coalition led by State Representative Daryl Metcalfe (R-Butler) and more than 30 fiscally conservative state lawmakers, state and national watchdog groups and radio talk show hosts.
“‘We The People’ were showing up in person to hold the governor accountable for six consecutive years of out-of-control spending, borrowing and fiscal irresponsibility that is directly responsible for the unprecedented $3 billion and growing Rendell budget deficit,” said Metcalfe. “What does the governor do? He left town yesterday on his ‘Tax You More Bus Tour.’ After declaring earlier this year that he would not tolerate any whining about his ‘painful’ budget cuts, the governor is once again traveling across the Commonwealth hosting repeated made for media pity parties to send the message that hard-working Pennsylvania citizens are simply not paying enough in taxes. Sorry governor, no matter how fast your bus speeds down the Pennsylvania Turnpike or across toll-free Interstate 80, you can run, but you can’t hide. Today’s protest is only the beginning of the battle to stop Pennsylvania state government’s tax-spend-and-borrow-a-thon.”
In addition to Metcalfe, other featured speakers included: Al Bienstock, Citizens Against Higher Taxes; Josh Culling, National Taxpayers’ Union; Bob Durgin and R.J. Harris, WHP 580; Patrick Gleason, Americans for Tax Reform; Kevin Shivers, NFIB; David Taylor, Pennsylvania Manufacturers’ Association; Susan Staub, Right to Work; Matthew Brouillette, Commonwealth Foundation; Jeffrey Trimbath, The Heritage Foundation; Colin Hanna, Let Freedom Ring and many others.
“Despite the misleading smoke-and-mirror attempts by the governor and his spend-a-holic accomplices, there are many options to deliver a balanced 2009-10 state budget that do not contain a job-killing, $3.1 billion personal income tax increase, including cracking down on welfare fraud and eliminating all discretionary spending or WAMS—just to name a few,” said Metcalfe. “If you are among the thousands of taxpaying Pennsylvanians who simply can no longer afford having any portion of your personal income redistributed to pay for someone else’s health care, bus fare or excessive public welfare, then I encourage you to keep logging on to StateCapitolProtest.com to learn more about what individual taxpayers can do to restore a state government of the people, by the people and for the people.”
Rep. Daryl Metcalfe
12th District
Pennsylvania House of Representatives
(724) 772-3110
(717) 783-1707
RepMetcalfe.com
Contact: Ty McCauslin
(717) 772-9979