On Saturday, Sen. Saxby Chambliss (R-GA) told a large home state crowd of activists and top political figures that he does not intend to adhere to the Grover Norquist anti-tax pledge.
“I think that you sent me to Washington to think for myself. And I want to vote the way you want me to vote,” he said, according to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. “I don’t want to be dictated to by anybody in Washington, as to how I’m going to vote on anything.”
He noted that the Norquist pledge — which he recently spoke out against, provoking a backlash from the anti-tax lobbyist — forbids closing tax deductions and credits unless each dollar of new revenue is used to lower rates. By that logic, Chambliss said, rolling back the ethanol tax credit (a popular idea in the South) to help pay down the debt would violate the pledge. Norquist has repeatedly affirmed that interpretation of the pledge.
”When I said I care about my country more than I do about a 20-year-old pledge, that’s what I’m talking about,” the senator said. “Things have changed in 20 years. We didn’t owe $17 trillion 20 years ago. We’re in a different world today.”
