Harris touts small-business agenda in N.H. as debate nears

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NORTH HAMPTON, N.H. – Vice President Kamala Harris rolled out another plank of her economic agenda here Wednesday, pitching small-business relief in a Democratic-leaning state ahead of her critical debate next week against former president Donald Trump.

“As president, one of my highest priorities will be to strengthen America’s small businesses,” Harris said while standing outside of a local brewery that benefited from President Joe Biden’s pandemic-era relief bill and other policies. “And here I am in New Hampshire to announce a few elements of my plan to do that.”

Harris went on to unveil a proposal to significantly expand tax deductions for small businesses and regulatory relief for those looking to start a company. The trip to Throwback Brewery was an effort to highlight the Biden administration’s record of small-business growth while also laying out plans to bolster the economy by supporting entrepreneurs in the future.

The visit marked one of her first major breaks with Biden on economic policy, with her campaign saying Wednesday that she supported a significantly lower capital gains tax rate for high earners than the current White House proposal.

While New Hampshire, which Democrats have carried in the last five presidential elections, has not been considered among the battleground states up for grabs in November, aides say Harris visited the Granite State in part to show that she is not taking any voters for granted and in part to woo the kind of moderate and Republican voters who dislike Trump.

“Our campaign is reaching voters of all political stripes – including Nikki Haley voters who are turned off by Trump’s extremism,” Harris’s campaign said in a statement, which noted that Haley, the former U.N. ambassador, garnered 43 percent of the state’s vote in her bid against Trump.

Trump’s campaign has suggested that Harris traveled to New Hampshire because she is struggling there. Many Democratic leaders in the state were upset when Biden opted to bypass its first-in-the-nation primary to elevate South Carolina this year.

Harris “sees there are problems for her campaign in New Hampshire because of the fact that they disrespected it in their primary and never showed up,” Trump wrote Tuesday on his social media platform Truth Social. “Additionally, the cost of living in New Hampshire is through the roof, their energy bills are some of highest in the country, and their housing market is the most unaffordable in history.”

In a statement before Harris spoke Wednesday, Trump’s campaign released a statement calling Harris’s small-business plans a “sham” that did not address the core issue of inflation or to account for the fact that she is the sitting vice president.

“Kamala has been in office for 3.5 years, so why hasn’t she done it already?” the statement said.

The economy is expected to be a major focus during Tuesday’s debate against the two candidates, and Harris has focused much of her policy rollout on what she has branded the “Opportunity Economy.”

Speaking to a crowd of several hundred people, Harris announced plans for a $50,000 tax benefit for small businesses, expanding the current $5,000 deduction for start-up firms by tenfold, according to a campaign official. Campaign aides say the proposal – part of a suite of new initiatives to boost entrepreneurship – would help draw a contrast with Trump, who has proposed tax cuts for corporations.

Trump and his campaign have sought to draw a contrast of their own, leaning into his polling advantage on economic matters. The former president has tried to brand Harris as excessively liberal, arguing that her policies have created inflation and stunted economic growth.

Harris’s latest proposal is part of an ongoing effort to combat Trump on that issue and woo some of the voters who dislike the former president but are concerned that Harris would be unfriendly to business.

In addition to the $50,000 tax deduction, Harris is proposing to create a new standard deduction for small firms to expedite their tax filings, lower barriers for occupational licenses, and approve incentives for state and local governments to make it easier to form start-ups, among other changes, the campaign official said. The plans are part of a bid to spur some 25 million new business applications over four years, up from the record 19 million since Biden took office.

Harris, who has supported Biden’s proposals to increase taxes on large corporations and the wealthy to pay for other Democratic priorities like child care, has not said how much her latest efforts would cost or how the government would pay for them.

She said Wednesday that she supports a 28 percent top capital gains rate for those earning more than $1 million, much lower than the 44.6 percent rate supported by Biden. Currently, top earners pay as much as 23.8 percent in capital gains taxes, which apply to the sale of assets.

Harris said she wants a rate that “rewards investment in America’s innovators, founders, and small businesses” – part of a rhetorical effort to push back against Trump’s assertion that she is a left-wing extremist.

The capital gains tax proposal was first reported by the Wall Street Journal.

Harris has not yet rolled out a comprehensive plan for taxes, though she has embraced new expanded tax credits for parents and backed many of Biden’s other proposals to increase taxes on high earners. On Wednesday, she said she supported a minimum tax on billionaires.

“Let us be clear: Billionaires and big corporations must pay their fair share in tax,” the vice president said, adding that it was not fair for the wealthy to pay lower tax rates than middle-class professionals.

While Harris’s speech mostly focused on the economy, she also touched on other topics that Democrats say will motivate key voting groups in the weeks ahead, including abortion, voting rights and gun violence.

Harris also expressed sorrow over a school shooting in Georgia on Wednesday that left at least four people dead and several others injured, calling it “tragic” and “senseless.”

“This is just a senseless tragedy on top of so many senseless tragedies,” she said at the beginning of her speech. “It’s just outrageous that every day in our country, in the United States of America, that parents have to send their children to school worried about whether or not their child will come home alive.”

Harris was speaking from behind a bulletproof glass, which was a security response to an assassination attempt on Trump in July.