Letter to the 400 richest Americans

Hi guys!

I just wanted you all to know that I am one American who is really glad that you got a well-deserved tax break in the One Big Beautiful Bill. I know a lot of people are jealous of you because you are really rich, but that’s no reason for you to have to be punished with high tax rates.

I mean the wealthy have always been hit up when the government needed money to spend. Except for now! And it was so important that you get this tax break even though we really didn’t have it to spare.

Can you believe that our government is actually BORROWING money to give you guys a tax break?

Anyway, I’m sending this to all of you who are on the “Forbes 400” list of the 400 wealthiest Americans. I wanted to send this to everybody who has an income of over a million bucks a year, but I just couldn’t afford the postage (or the paper! Ha ha). So I hope you guys will spread the word to all the others.

Even so, at 5.4 trillion bucks, all 400 of you control a pretty big chunk of change. Boy, it must be hard to figure out how to spend that kind of money!

Even Jeff’s wedding last week – you don’t mind if I call you Jeff do you? I mean, if you want me to say Mr. Bezos, I’ll be happy to – anyway, it only cost $40 million. And, hey, I believe if you got it, flaunt it! I mean, that would be a lot of money to some people, but like I say, it’s yours to spend.

So anyway, you got a well-deserved tax break and just think of how much you’ll be able to save on this year’s taxes because your wealth (by your I mean all 400 of you) increased by $1 trillion last year alone! Hey, that’s almost a 20% increase! Great work guys! (and girls, too. I don’t mean to sound insensitive. It’s just my mother was from North Dakota and she called everybody guys.)

So, I don’t know exactly what you guys’ share of the tax cut is, but I for one have no – as in NO – problem with our having to borrow money to cover it. Hey. No pain no gain!

The only thing I’m a teensy bit concerned about is the interest rate we have to pay to all those foreign governments and investors that we borrow the money from because it looks like the interest rates are going to go up. So, anyway, good going guys, you deserve it!

And I kind of hate to bring this up, but for me personally, because of the money that the One Big Beautiful Act had to cut (besides what we borrowed) to help pay for your tax break, times have gotten a little dicey for some of us here in Montana. I mean, even Senator Tim Sheehy had to put his Flathead Lake house on the market for $10 million.

Anyway, Mom has diabetes and they are talking about cutting off her Medicaid if she doesn’t get a job, and believe me, jobs in Ingomar, Montana (that’s where she lives) were pretty hard to come by even before they shut down the Jersey Lil (that’ s the old saloon that used to be there) and that leaves the Post Office which isn’t hiring and anyway she can’t drive.

And where I live – and I DO work it just don’t – sorry, doesn’t – pay much they are having to cut out the school lunch program and our “food stamp” money’s been cut, too, so it’s getting a little hard to cover the bills.

So, if you guys could help out – even a little – it would sure help us out a lot. If you could each send me twenty bucks it would be great. Hey, I’m on your side!

Send it to me, Aaron Slick, Punkin Crick, Montana. And THANKS!!

Montana Viewpoint has appeared in weekly and online newspapers across Montana for more than 30 years. Jim Elliott served 16 years in the Montana Legislature as a state representative and state senator. He lives on his ranch in Trout Creek.