Gallego Unveils Sweeping Economic Agenda to Restore America’s Middle Class

“Saving the Middle Class and Restoring the American Dream” details five pillars of the senator’s economic policy plan WASHINGTON — Today, Senator Ruben Gallego (D-AZ) released his sweeping economic policy plan to rebuild America’s middle class . The five-pillar plan, “ Saving the Middle Class and Restoring the American Dream, ” includes a tax on data centers and AI, a New-Deal style public service jobs program, and raising the minimum wage to $20-per-hour to build an economy by-and-for the middle class — not the elites. “For far too long, we’ve had a broken economy where hard work just isn’t nearly enough. The federal government let giant corporations, billionaires, and elites write the rules, and we’re living with the results: costs have soared, wages have stalled, and jobs have left. This bipartisan, failed status quo must end,” said Senator Gallego. “Working-class Americans aren’t asking for handouts. They don’t resent anyone else’s success — they just want a fair system. Work hard enough, and you should be able to get ahead, provide for your kids, take a vacation, and even get rich.” Pillar 1, titled “Raise Wages and Improve Benefits,” outlines the senator’s plan to bring the American Dream back within reach by: Moving to sectoral bargaining and increasing union membership: The senator wants to move beyond the PRO Act and toward sectoral bargaining. Senator Gallego is the among the first Democrats to call for sectoral bargaining and is the first politician to state that it should be the goal of the U.S. government to triple union density by 2035. Raising the minimum wage to $20-per-hour and require companies to pay double for overtime work — not time-and-a-half. Cracking down on worker misclassification by ending the ability of employers, like Uber and DoorDash, to misclassify employees as “independent contractors” to skirt minimum wage, overtime, unemployment insurance, and workers’ compensation responsibilities. Creating an Office of Worker Empowerment and Office of Worker Advocacy: Sen. Gallego is the first federal politician to call for the creation of these offices. Pillar 2, titled “Create and Protect Quality Blue Collar Jobs” would safeguard and grow job opportunity by: Creating a trade policy for the working class by: Repealing President Trump’s reckless, across-the-board global tariffs and ending his trade war with Canada. Pursuing a strategic trade policy targeting unfair practices by chronic-surplus countries like China. Combining trade and other industrial policies to effectively grow domestic industry. Creating an Industrial Policy Council at the Executive Office of the President: Similar to the National Security Council, the plan calls for the creation of an entity to coordinate government industrial policy initiatives and ensure all efforts reflect worker-first, community-first growth. Pillar 3, titled “Restoring Worker Trust in Government in the Age of Artificial Intelligence” would ensure workers have a voice in how AI shapes the workforce and get a fair share of the prosperity it creates by: Creating a New-Deal style public service jobs program: The program would fund jobs that allow AI-displaced workers to serve the public, funded by taxing AI. Sen. Gallego is one of the first Democrats to call for a large-scale public jobs program. Requiring industry and workers to negotiate over AI: Sen. Gallego is among the first politicians to propose this idea. This approach mirrors the way in which actors and writers negotiated with Hollywood after the strike in 2023 over AI, guaranteeing workers have a seat at the table. Creating a corporate “robot” tax to discourage job dislocation and maintain company payroll contributions for automated-away jobs. Pillar 4, titled “Expand Job-Creating Entrepreneurship, Focusing Outside of Superstar Cities” would grow Main Street communities by: Creating a data center tax: Senator Gallego is calling for a 10% excise tax on data centers and for the removal of many data center tax breaks like bonus depreciation and deductions for state and local taxes. Specifically, Senator Gallego is calling on data centers to benefit communities by: Using excise tax revenue to fund community investments. Requiring data centers to cover the full cost of needed generation, transmission, and distribution upgrades to the grid rather than shifting costs to families and businesses. Requiring data centers to bring additional energy to the grid, preventing energy cost increases for consumers and creating new production jobs —and require them to sustain energy investments even if they abandon the project. Preventing data centers from using key chips and components from China to spur domestic manufacturing. Pushing data centers to pay high wages and use union labor. Protecting small businesses from giant corporations by modernizing and enforcing antitrust laws. Pillar 5, titled “Help Workers Find Jobs Faster” would improve the job search process by: Cracking down on fake job postings known as “ghost jobs,” prohibiting companies from posting job advertisements that they have no intention of actually filling. Giving laid-off workers more time to find a new job: The plan calls for requiring companies to provide affected workers with 120-day notice in the event of a mass layoff or closure. Currently, the federal Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification (WARN) Act only requires companies to give employees 60-day notice. “Saving the Middle Class and Restoring the American Dream” is one of several policy plans Senator Gallego has released since the start of his Senate term. He has also outlined comprehensive plans on border security and immigration reform , energy affordability and innovation , housing , and public education . Read the full plan HERE .