Dear Editor,
David Zuckerman has been at the forefront of Vermont politics over the last two decades in all the wrong ways. Throughout his time in the House, Senate, and as lieutenant governor, he has demonstrated that no tax is too large, no fee is too substantial, and no amount of frivolous spending is too great to satisfy his extreme far-left appetite.
Zuckerman’s record includes sponsoring and voting for hundreds of millions of dollars in tax increases on Vermonters, including a new 7.8% payroll tax, income tax hikes on working Vermonters in the middle of the Great Recession, a carbon tax, and more.
As lieutenant governor, Zuckerman’s office budget grew by an astonishing rate of 30 percent over just two years, at a time when Vermonters paychecks barely budged. While state government struggles with persistent budget gaps, David Zuckerman expects struggling Vermonters to pick up the tab so he can live beyond his means.
And as Vermont’s unfunded liabilities surpass $4.5 billion, Zuckerman is insistent in his support for divesting the state’s pension funds from fossil fuels, which experts (including Democratic Treasurer Pearce) say could cost millions more, further exacerbating our delicate financial situation that has resulted in multiple recent credit rating downgrades.
If David Zuckerman intends to act as governor the same way he has operated over the last two decades in politics, then Vermonters should hold onto their wallets…. In short, the crisis of affordability would continue to spiral out of control.
Thankfully, Zuckerman’s fringe ideas are so out of the mainstream that the prospect of a Zuckerman Administration is nothing more than a delusion which will never come to fruition. Voters will see through his rhetoric and reject his calls for even higher taxes through their actions at the ballot box in November.
His candidacy for governor will closely follow his predictable pattern of reckless spending of our hard-earned paychecks.
Deb Billado,
Republican Party chair
