Trump Takes Credit For Biden-Era $1,000 Match For Low-Income Retirement Plans | EUROtoday

WASHINGTON – A proposal to present lower-income staff a $1,000 federal match for his or her retirement accounts, one among President Donald Trump’s few coverage concepts in his State of the Union speech, is definitely already on the books, due to a 2022 legislation signed by Democratic predecessor Joe Biden.

“Half of all of working Americans still do not have access to a retirement plan with matching contributions from an employer. To remedy this gross disparity, I am announcing that next year, my administration will give these often-forgotten American workers, great people, the people that built our country, access to the same type of retirement plan offered to every federal worker. We will match your contribution with up to $1,000 each year,” Trump proclaimed in his remarks, which at 108 minutes broke his personal report for longest handle to a joint session of Congress.

What he uncared for to say was that the proposal is already legislation of the land, set to start in 2027. The thought was one among quite a few revisions to retirement plans contained within the bipartisan SECURE 2.0 Act, which was rolled into the 2023 appropriations invoice that Biden signed into legislation on Dec. 29, 2022.

“Nothing Trump does surprises me anymore: not being associated with a pedophile in Jeffrey Epstein, not making a case for war with Iran, and not taking credit for a Biden-era policy and then immediately blaming Biden for everything else,” mentioned Alexandra LaManna, a former Treasury Department spokesperson in the course of the Biden administration

The particular “Saver’s Match” language provides lower-income staff a 50% match on their very own contributions to a retirement account, with a restrict of $1,000 per yr. The match begins to part out for these whose adjusted gross incomes exceed $20,500 for single filers and $41,000 for married {couples} submitting collectively.

It is unclear what exactly Trump would do to boost that, though his reference to “same type of retirement plan offered to every federal worker” means that staff would have the choice of getting an account administered by the federal authorities.

Trump White House spokeswoman Kush Desai attacked Biden personally and advised that the “Saver’s Match” provision was created by the unique SECURE Act that Trump signed into legislation in his first time period in 2019.

“Joe Biden was a disaster, and no one wants to take ‘credit’ for anything associated with that failure of a presidency. It was President Trump who signed the bipartisan SECURE Act into law in 2019, while Joe Biden likely auto-penned additions to President Trump’s legislation in a larger appropriations act that few D.C. insiders, let alone everyday American workers, are familiar with,” Desai mentioned.

However, the unique 2019 legislation didn’t create the availability in query, and the $1,000 match didn’t grow to be legislation till 2022, with an implementation date of 2027.

The Treasury Department, which might be in command of this system, didn’t reply to a HuffPost question.

In an interview with NBC News following the speech, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent implied that the entire program was Trump’s thought.

“The president wanted to preview it in his speech, but I think this is going to be a very big part of working Americans’ retirement program, because there is a tremendous amount of financial insecurity,” he mentioned.

Desai mentioned later that the administration remains to be crafting language to make this system simpler to entry for many who want it.

Democratic National Committee chairman Ken Martin mentioned taking credit score for others’ work is no surprise from Trump.

“Trump has spent much of his career slapping his name on other people’s work, and this latest attempt was just as pathetic as the last,” he mentioned. “Making life more affordable is the issue Americans care about most, and he’s failing at it, because he’s actually focused on looking out for billionaires, not working families.”