A tax cut for seniors? Promise broken

By Angie Drobnic Holan
Published on Wednesday, April 15th, 2009 at 5:30 p.m.

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Have you filed your taxes yet? They're due by midnight.

President Barack Obama's campaign pledge to end taxes for seniors making less than $50,000 has fallen off the radar.

It wasn't part of the tax cuts in the economic stimulus bill, also known as the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act. It wasn't in Obama's first budget outline, which was approved by Congress on April 2, 2009. And it's not part of any proposed legislation that we can find.

Today, on Tax Day, Obama gave a speech in which he talked about his other tax promises and how he wants to reshape the tax code to make it simple and more efficient. But he never mentioned his promise of curtailing the income tax for seniors.

The Obama administration has done other things for seniors. Thanks to the stimulus bill, for example, everyone who gets Social Security benefits will receive a $250 check from the government in May. But the bold promise to end taxes for seniors if they make less than $50,000 seems to be forgotten.

We asked the White House about it, but got no response. If this promise is ever revived, we'll revisit our ruling. But for now, this is a Promise Broken. (To read our full report on this promise, including our previous coverage, click here .)