President Obama on Thursday will take his case for higher taxes for the wealthy to Northern Virginia, where he will focus on the need to extend current rates to all but the top 2 percent of earners.
As the year-end deadline for a budget deal to avoid the so-called fiscal cliff of tax increases and spending cuts gets closer, Mr. Obama is trying to build public pressure on Republicans to accept his terms. Republicans this week said they are willing to raise revenues but only through closing loopholes and eliminating certain deductions on the rich.
The president plans to visit the home of a middle-class family in a Northern Virginia suburb to discuss the importance of extending income taxes for the majority of Americans, according to a White House official.
If Washington fails to strike a deal, the White House estimates that the average American family would face a tax increase of $2,200. A member of the family Mr. Obama plans to visit used social media and the White House-promoted hashtag #My2K to tell her story about the impact losing that income would have on them.
Since urging people to use #My2K, the White House says it has received 100,000 messages from people in the country while 260,000 have used the hashtag on Twitter and other social media sites.
