End Grocery Tax on Mississippi-Grown Food, Democratic Agriculture Candidate Says

[TexasTowelie]

Mississippians will no longer have to pay a sales tax when they buy Mississippi-grown foods at the grocery store if the Democrat running for the state's top agriculture position gets his way.

#Rickey Cole, the 53-year-old Democratic nominee for commissioner of agriculture, first unveiled his plan to end the 7% tax on any food product that the state's farmers grow on Sept. 30. He says it would bolster the state's economy and local businesses.

#"Ninety percent of the food we eat in Mississippi is brought in from out of state—much of it from foreign countries," Cole said. "So now we have to pay tariffs, we have to pay income tax, and then we have to pay taxes again at the cash register. We spend nearly $6 billion a year on this long-distance or foreign food when we could be producing much of what we eat right here in Mississippi."

#Cole, who served as the Mississippi Democratic Party chairman from 2001 to 2004, is challenging incumbent Commissioner of Agriculture Andy Gipson, the Republican nominee. Mississippi Gov. Phil Bryant appointed Gipson, then a conservative member of the Mississippi House of Representatives, in 2018 after Cindy Hyde-Smith left the position to go to the U.S. Senate that same year.

Read more: http://www.jacksonfreepress.com/news/2019/oct/14/end-grocery-tax-mississippi-grown-food-dem-agricul/

[PoindexterOglethorpe]

1. What a shame any groceries are taxed in any state.