Business

Clinton surrogate: Trump a ‘terrible choice for women voters’

Surrogates for Hillary Clinton on Wednesday called out Donald Trump for taking positions they say are harmful to women.

{mosads}“Donald Trump has made it entirely clear throughout the entirety of this campaign that he would be a terrible choice for women voters and women broadly,” former Clinton policy adviser Neera Tanden said on a call held by the Democratic presidential front-runner’s campaign.

The call comes as the Clinton campaign has stepped up its attacks on Trump since the businessman became the presumptive GOP nominee last week. 

“Hillary is definitely running an issues campaign, and Donald is trying to change the subject,” Sen. Barbara Mikulski (D-Md.) said on the call, adding, “The facts do speak for themselves. There is a gender gap in pay.”

Tanden criticized Trump for his opposition to the right to an abortion as well as his positions on four economic issues: equal pay, the minimum wage, childcare and taxes.

She blasted Trump for saying that the way to remedy the wage gap between men and women is for women to do a better job and for saying that it should be up to employers to address rising childcare costs.

She also criticized Trump for saying on Sunday that he does not support a federal floor for the minimum wage. Tanden said that doing away with a federal floor “would basically devastate many, many families.”

Additionally, Tanden took issue with the fact that Trump’s tax plan gives wealthy Americans a large tax cut.

“Women who rely disproportionately on Social Security can’t afford such an irresponsible giveaway,” she said.

While Trump may make changes to his tax plan, Tanden said “the reality is that when he laid out his plan to much fanfare, he said this was the best plan.”

Trump had made comments over the weekend suggesting that he was open to negotiating on tax rates for the wealthy. On Monday, he said that he still intends to lower taxes for the rich but that the tax rate for high earners may end up being higher than the 25 percent rate proposed in his plan 
 
“I am lowering taxes far more than any other candidate,” he tweeted. “Any negotiated increase by Congress to my proposal would still be lower than current!” 
 
Politico reported Wednesday that the Trump campaign has tasked economists with revising Trump’s tax plan to reduce its cost. The economists have recommended that the top tax rate in Trump’s proposal be increased to 28 percent, which is still below the current top rate of 39.6 percent. Trump has not yet accepted the recommendations.