The clock is ticking on Joe Biden’s time in the White House.
He’s using his remaining days to have the federal government help Democrats.
And Mitch McConnell was blindsided when Joe Biden pulled one dirty trick he never saw coming.
Federal tax credit to a key industry helps vulnerable Democrat Senator
Senate Democrats are clinging to a narrow 51-49 majority heading into Election Day and need everything to go their way to keep control.
U.S. Senator Jon Tester (D-MT) is fighting for his political life as the last statewide elected Democrat in Montana.
He hasn’t led in a public poll out of the state against Republican challenger Tim Sheehy since the beginning of August.
The Montana race will almost certainly decide which party is in control of the Senate next January.
President Joe Biden is trying to throw Tester a lifeline in the closing days of the race.
The Inflation Reduction Act – a $1 trillion slush fund for Green New Deal policies – included federal tax credits designed to help the mining industry for minerals that are essential to green energy.
Now, those tax credits are expanded to help the mining industry in Montana.
Mining companies can now get tax credits for extracting and refining minerals used in green energy.
The mining industry has been under assault by Democrats for years dating back to former President Barack Obama.
Expanded tax credits give Tester a last-minute win in a state where mining is a source of good-paying jobs.
“We’re creating real incentives for domestic mining here in the United States,” Deputy Treasury Secretary Wally Adeyemo said.
Tester took a victory lap for pressuring the Biden-Harris administration to make the change.
The tax credits would help the struggling Sibanye-Stillwater mine – the country’s largest mine for palladium and platinum.
“I’m glad to see the administration is listening to our calls to ensure American mines like the one in Stillwater receive additional support and keep more Montanans in their jobs,” Tester said.
Biden’s handout could be too little, too late
Tester has been hammered for his support of environmental extremists that resulted in copper and coal mines being shut down in Montana.
He got a win from the change in tax credits for mining but it could be a case of too little, too late.
Tester voted with the Biden-Harris administration 99% time during the 117th Congress from 2021 to 2023.
He’s been a rubber stamp for the Democrat agenda since he was first elected to Congress in 2006.
Tester talks like a moderate in Montana and votes like a radical left-wing Democrat when he’s in Washington, D.C.
But voters have wised up to his act this election.
Tester trails by 6.5% in the RealClearPolitics polling average of the state.
And he has to share a ballot with former President Donald Trump on Election Day.
Trump is expected to easily win Montana for the third time and endorsed Tester’s opponent Tim Sheehy.
It will be nearly impossible for Tester to get tens of thousands of Trump supporters to split their tickets this election.
A tax credit for mining is too late in the election to save Jon Tester from doom on Election Day.