WASHINGTON, D.C. (NAFB) – Senate Republicans stepped up attacks on a plan to help fund new infrastructure by ending “stepped-up basis,” used by producers to reduce capital gains taxes at death. Republicans, on the same day they dealt a temporary blow to Democrats’ plans to advance a costly Biden infrastructure bill, launched an attack on a key revenue source for the bill—farmers.

Senate GOP leader Mitch McConnell says without a “stepped-up basis” that figures farm asset values at the time of death, not purchase, to ease the inheritance tax burden, many farmers will feel a massive squeeze.

Missouri Senator Roy Blunt says for farmers, it’s not about milking the tax system.

Kansas Senator Jerry Moran says it’s all about the next generation.

USDA Secretary Tom Vilsack says most family farms would be exempted from a proposed new capital gains tax at death. But the American Farm Bureau and some 40 other farm groups are skeptical and have written Congressional leaders not to heap new tax burdens on farmers, including a plan to limit “like-kind exchanges” of farmland.