When it comes to "fact checking" conservatives, PolitiFact seems at war with plain English. The conservative group Americans for Prosperity offered an ad on Facebook criticizing Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.) as he seeks re-election in a tough battle with Republican Gov. Jim Justice.
"The Inflation Reduction Act led to higher taxes," the ad said.
On Thursday, PolitiFact ruled this is "Mostly False," when it's true.
We won't even get into whether the "Inflation Reduction Act" has reduced inflation.
PolitiFact's Anthony Starkey -- currently a student at West Virginia University -- argued: "However, this assertion is exaggerated....The Inflation Reduction Act does not raise income taxes for the broad swath of individual taxpayers; its tax increases are targeted at very large companies and wealthy people."
Americans for Prosperity was allowed to rebut:
Although these taxes are poised to hit large corporations and high-income taxpayers directly, "the costs of higher taxes are also borne by the corporations’ workers, consumers, and the economy as a whole," Americans for Prosperity told PolitiFact West Virginia in a statement. [Emphasis ours.]
But then PolitiFact goes to its liberal experts:
However, analysts say these spillover effects should be small.
"If you are not in the top 1% of taxpayers, you likely won’t notice any effect of the tax increases included in the law," said John Buhl, a senior communications manager for the Urban Institute-Brookings Institution Tax Policy Center, which analyzes tax issues.
This college kid couldn't even provide a link to the actual Facebook ad. You get this.
That's it -- a true statement is "Mostly False," because the Democrats might be damaged. This is Starkey's inane overall conclusion:
Americans for Prosperity said, "The Inflation Reduction Act led to higher taxes."
Taxes are poised to increase under the law, but the increases are targeted at very large corporations and the richest Americans.
These tax increases could be passed indirectly to taxpayers with more modest incomes. But overall, independent analyses have found that ordinary Americans can expect to see little, if any, change in what they pay in taxes.
We rate the statement Mostly False.
