# Pants on Fire -- NRCC Gets it All Wrong

*Published:* 2009-04-01
*Author:* Sam Parry

### Claim

> “MIT researchers released an ‘Assessment of U.S. Cap-and-Trade Proposals,’ which shows that the increase would be an increase of more than $3,000 a year for each household.
> 
> — From press release issued by the National Republican Congressional Committee targeting new and politically vulnerable House Democrats, March 31, 2009.

### Truth

> PolitiFact, a nonpartisan watchdog group whose [full response is available here](http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2009/mar/30/house-republicans/GOP-full-of-hot-air-about-Obamas-light-switch-tax/), calls this a “Pants on Fire” lie.
> 
> According to PolitiFact, the NRCC used an MIT report analyzing a similar cap-and-trade bill last year. The MIT report said the bill, under certain assumptions, could raise $366 billion per year. The NRCC divided this by 117 million households in the U.S. to get to $3,128.
> 
> But, according to John Reilly, an MIT economist and one of the authors of the report, the interpretation that what is raised under a cap policy can be equated to cost per household is “just wrong. It’s wrong in so many ways it’s hard to begin…”
> 
> And, courtesy of Think Progress, [here is a letter \[pdf\]](http://thinkprogress.org/wp-content/uploads/2009/04/republican.pdf) Reilly just sent to House Republican Minority Leader John Boehner urging the NRCC to stop misrepresenting the MIT report.
> 
> [Read the full PolitiFact post](http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2009/mar/30/house-republicans/GOP-full-of-hot-air-about-Obamas-light-switch-tax/) for more on how NRCC got this all wrong.
> 
> Pants on fire indeed!