John McCain
Livestrong Summit
Columbus, OH - 07/24/08
TRANSCRIPT:
PAULA ZAHN: [...] A lot of out people out here believe that if you were to raise the Federal cigarette tax, that it would in fact cause fewer younger people to smoke, and might even deter people who are already adults who smoke from smoking anymore. As president, would you support an increase of a Federal tax on tobacco?
MCCAIN: I don't think I would, because I don't think the money is being spent on the state taxes right now. I would have to be confident before I would consider it that it would not be taken by the Congress and put into general revenues. The way the states have done with the tobacco taxes that they impose and they put it in the general revenues. And my friends, before they became completely in the tank we were showing reductions among young peoples use of tobacco through the effective use of anti-tobacco funds and advertising. And it was all over America, particularly in some states like California. So my first thing that would have to happen is I have to be assured that that money would be put in the right place.
And to tell you the truth, I am not confident that the Congress of the United States would do that. Because, does anybody here have confidence in Congress? Please raise your hand, you're one of the 9 percent approval rating of Congress today.
ZAHN: So is there any circumstance that could be proven to you, if there was a direct correlation between taxes going up and the use of tobacco going down?
MCCAIN: It would have to be proven and frankly the constitution of this Congress, they couldn't prove it to me, because I don't believe them. I don't. I've seen corruption in Congress. Ok? We have former members of Congress now residing in Federal prison. So, we'd have to clean up Congress and I think the American people are ready to do that.
And by the way, I'm not for raising anybody's taxes. I think, right now with these economic problems we have, lower taxes is what we need.
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