GOP to Release New 'Contract with America' - Original Led to Historic Landslide in 90s
House Republicans are putting together a “Commitment to America” policy agenda to run on this fall in the spirit of the “Contract with America” that led to a historic GOP landslide in the 1994 midterms.
In those elections, Republicans gained 54 seats and the House and the GOP took control of the Senate, marking the first time the party had held both chambers since the 1950s.
Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich, who helped craft the ’94 contract, is working with House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy and his fellow Republicans to put together the new document.
“McCarthy and his team are developing a Commitment to America. Having participated with Ronald Reagan’s efforts in 1980, the 1994 Contract, and John Boehner’s successful 2010 campaign to retake the House, I can report that McCarthy’s effort is the largest, most inclusive, and most systematic issue development effort I have ever seen,” Gingrich wrote in a Wednesday piece for Fox News.
The former speaker predicted that a positive Republican agenda coupled with the current failures of the Biden administration could lead to “the largest American Majority our country has ever seen.”
The Real Clear Politics average of polls for the generic ballot shows Republicans ahead by 3.6 percent, but a Rasmussen poll conducted last month has the Grand Old Party leading by 11 percent.
When Republicans led by 12 percent in a Rasmussen poll in the fall of 2010, they took back 63 seats in the House in the Tea Party Revolution.
“[McCarthy] really does want to drive home that we can’t just have a negative anti-Biden campaign — we need a positive message, too,” Gingrich told The Washington Post in January.
“I think that’s clearly what McCarthy wants to do and I’ve offered to look at stuff and offer advice. There’s lots of people in the House working on it. It will be a widespread commitment.”
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The original Contract with America included a pledge to vote on a balanced budget amendment; a line-item veto; anti-crime legislation; a work requirement for welfare; the Family Reinforcement Act, strengthening parents’ rights in their children’s education; tax cuts for families and businesses; and term limits, among other provisions.
Three hundred and sixty-seven Republican candidates signed the document.
The House voted on all the measures, and some also passed the Senate and were signed into law by then-President Bill Clinton, including the welfare reform and tax cuts for families and businesses. The line-item veto passed, but ultimately was ruled unconstitutional by the Supreme Court.
McCarthy listed for Breitbart in January some of the issues the GOP’s Commitment to America will address, such as parental rights in education, energy policy, inflation, border security and safe streets.
Former Trump economic advisers Larry Kudlow and Stephen Moore recommended in a February article for The Wall Street Journal that Republicans also include making the Trump tax cuts permanent in their agenda.
“It’s a great idea for Republicans to draw a sharp contrast with the Biden agenda of trillions in new spending, higher tax rates on businesses, the reregulation of America, and the war on domestic energy. Voters want to know what Republicans are for,” they wrote.
“At the top of this list of GOP legislative promises, along with school choice and a pro-growth energy strategy, should be to make the 2017 tax cuts permanent. The Tax Cuts and Jobs Act was designed to spur investment, hiring and innovation — and it worked,” Kudlow and Moore added.
During former President Donald Trump’s term, prior to the coronavirus shutdowns, the nation experienced its lowest unemployment rate in 50 years and highest number of people employed, ever — 160 million.
With the cuts still in place, we’re getting close to those numbers again.
Further, thanks to the increased economic activity generated by the tax reforms, the Treasury took in a record $4 trillion in fiscal year 2021 and is on track to receive $4.5 trillion this year.
The tax cuts are due to begin expiring in 2023, with most going away at the end of 2025.
