Tim Eyman announces new ballot initiative seeking to invalidate state’s capital gains tax
Sep 9, 2021, 12:02 PM
Anti-tax activist Tim Eyman. (Photo by Karen Ducey/Getty Images)
(Photo by Karen Ducey/Getty Images)
Activist Tim Eyman announced a new ballot initiative on Thursday, which would seek to invalidate Washington state’s recently-passed capital gains tax, and prevent the state — as well as individual cities — from imposing any future excise, income, or payroll taxes.
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Registered as Initiative 1373, it would also invalidate Seattle’s JumpStart tax, which levies a tax on corporations with payrolls over $7 million.
“This is our only chance to forever protect ourselves from any kind of income tax,” Eyman said in a news release announcing the measure.
Eyman is targeting the November 2022 election for the initiative, needing 400,000 signatures by Dec. 30 of this year. He estimates it will cost roughly $2.7 million to get on the ballot, calling on supporters to donate to his Permanent Offense PAC to fund the effort.
Eyman’s last ballot initiative — I-976 — was approved by voters in 2019, but the $30 car tabs measure was later struck down by the Supreme Court of Washington as unconstitutional for violating the state’s single subject rule.
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He also ran into legal trouble early in 2021, after a Thurston County Superior Court judge fined him for $2.6 million, while barring him from managing any and all finances for political committees.
The case brought by the state against Eyman — originally filed in 2017 by Attorney General Bob Ferguson — alleged that Eyman had received kickbacks from donors contributing money to his initiatives, and then used that money for personal gain.
Eyman was previously banned from serving as treasurer for initiative campaigns following a ruling in a separate 2002 court case. For the most recent litigation, the state asked the court to enact more stringent restrictions, claiming that Eyman “continued to act as the de facto treasurer for political committees even though he was not named treasurer” in the years to follow.
