No, 'congressional Republicans' are not planning a middle-class tax hike Federal income taxes were due on Monday, and the White House marked the occasion by criticizing "congressional Republicans" for proposing a massive tax increase on the middle class. The plan has provided a rare opportunity for Democrats, who are frequently tagged as tax increasers by Republicans. But, wait, who are these congressional Republicans? It turns out it is just one — Sen. Rick Scott (R-Fla.) — and he's quickly running away from his own proposal. Scott is chair of the National Republican Senatorial Committee (NRSC) and thus part of the Senate leadership. In February, Scott released a 60-page "11-point plan to rescue America" that offered 128 proposals, including this one: "All Americans should pay some income tax to have skin in the game, even if a small amount. Currently over half of Americans pay no income tax." In reality, fewer than 17 percent of households pay no federal tax; even those who earn too little to owe income tax still pay payroll taxes (for Social Security and Medicare) and excise taxes. Scott provided no details on his plan and offered no proposed legislative language. He now claims the line in his document was misinterpreted and that anyone already paying "income tax, payroll tax, state and local taxes" would be unaffected. One cannot instantly assume every person in a political party supports a proposal by a prominent member — and indeed we found no other supporters in the GOP for this idea. Scott has not officially abandoned the original language and the idea still does technically exist on paper. So the White House earned Three Pinocchios. Enjoy this newsletter? Forward it to someone else who'd like it! If this email was forwarded to you, sign up here. Did you hear something fact-checkable? Send it here; we'll check it out. Russian uranium sales to the USA: The value is elusive The Biden administration has imposed sweeping sanctions on Russia since Moscow's invasion of Ukraine, including eliminating preferential trading privileges and banning imports of Russian oil, liquefied natural gas and coal. So we were surprised to hear Sen. John Barrasso (R-Wyo.) say that Russia received nearly $1 billion for uranium sales to the United States in 2021 and is on track to earn $1.2 billion this year. Barrasso, the senior Republican on the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, represents Wyoming, which has uranium mines that would benefit from a ban on Russian uranium. That constituency might have made Barrasso a suspect source, though we have found that he does not routinely make up his numbers. It turns out that it was unexpectedly hard to land on a solid answer. Different government agencies churn out data that cannot easily be added together. Moreover, uranium does not trade on an open market like other commodities, so buyers and sellers negotiate contracts privately. Barrasso's number is difficult to verify and appears somewhat exaggerated. In digging through the data, we found that the math he used did not make much sense. But getting a handle on the actual number is wildly complicated. Saying Russia earned "nearly $1 billion" for uranium sales to the United States in 2021 is probably good enough for government work. Given the difficulty of reaching a firm conclusion, we left his claim unrated.  Work cat 2 | We're always looking for fact-check suggestions. You can reach us via email, Twitter (@GlennKesslerWP and @AdriUsero) or Facebook. Read about our process and rating scale here, and sign up for the newsletter here. Scroll down for this week's Pinocchio roundup. | 
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