WASHINGTON STATE WIRE: An election-year tax holiday proposal

Paul Queary reports in the Washington State Wire:

Lawmakers are full of ideas this year about how to spend the state’s significant budget surplus, some of them with an eye firmly fixed on November’s election… Tuesday’s House Finance Committee hearing on a proposed one-time sales tax holiday for Labor Day weekend fell neatly into this category. House Bill 2018 comes from Rep. Dave Paul, the only Democrat int he delegation from Island County’s 10th District.…

The 10th has been a swing district for decades. Paul won his seat by 685 votes in 2018, a big Democratic year. He survived a tough challenge in 2020 by 738 votes after a campaign that featured more than $1 million in spending by the candidates and independent groups. GOP candidates won carried the other House seat and the Senate position. Paul’s a prime target for Republicans and allied independent groups this year.

They Said It

[State Representative Dave] Paul cast the bill as a boost for pandemic-battered small businesses that would also help struggling families afford school supplies and provide temporary tax relief from a tax system that falls heavily on the poor and lightly on the wealthy.