1. United States
2. Iowa
3. Letter

I just read an article on how the Trump tax bill taxes the endowment of Grinnell College. It is unconscionable that you would allow this institution to be taxed so heavily on a charitable endowment that helps students get a good education while you throw money and tax breaks at billionaires. It is ironic that Republicans of all stripes seem happy to take away taxpayer money from public education and give it to private schools at the same time Republicans are attacking the endowments of private colleges and universities. Meanwhile, this administration is unconstitutionally punishing any school that dares to protect the exercise of their students’ and faculty’s free speech rights that may differ from with whatever lame-brained policy Dear Leader hatches. This administration — and by your silence, YOU — are destroying education, science, and research in this country. You are making it so much harder for someone to get a good education to get ahead. You are killing research. You are killing opportunity. The old Reaganesque notion — false though it was at inception — that anyone can lift themselves up by their own bootstraps is in tatters. This country will never recover from the damage this administration is doing to education, science, and technology. If you allow this to go ahead, you are complicit with your silence. I want to believe that you still hold on to some semblance of a belief in some of the shared ideals of Iowa excellence in science and education. I want to believe that you know that taxing a charitable endowment is really a roundabout way of attacking the perceived political leanings of the institutions and that you know that these endowments — particularly the one for Grinnell College — are a hugh help to students and their families for chasing the American dream. I know this from personal experience. This bill is as far from fiscal responsibility and protecting the health and safety of citizens as it could be. Please vote to get rid of the tax on educational endowments. Please vote for fiscal responsibility. Please vote to support the health and safety of your constituents such as funding the FAA, NOAA, FEMA, science, and research. You cannot make America great by giving all the breaks to the billionaires and oligarchs and telling the rest of us to pound sand.