Democratic Rep. Tim Ryan (Ohio) on Wednesday publicly backed President Donald Trump's ideal corporate tax rate of 15 percent.
Appearing on Fox News' "Your World With Neil Cavuto," Ryan supported the substantially reduced tax rate to help bolster midwestern cities like the one he represents in Congress.
Trump's tax plan, rolled out in April, includes a 15 percent corporate tax rate, although negotiators are said to be aiming for between 20 and 25 percent. The current U.S. corporate rate — 39.1 percent as of 2014 — is the highest among developed economies, and third in the world, after only the United Arab Emirates and Puerto Rico.
"If he's looking for Democratic support from guys like me," Ryan said of Trump's tax plan, "you need tax simplification. The code is way too complicated at this point. It's too hard for businesses."
"I think it's too much of a burden on smaller businesses. I would support a reduction of the corporate tax rate," he said.
"Would you be for them getting as low as the president wants to get them, to 15 percent?" host Neil Cavuto asked.
"Yeah, I think that's an appropriate number," Ryan said.
"Look, in places like Youngstown and Akron, Ohio, we need investors. We need people to make investments in our community to hire the workers that we all talk about so much," he said.
"You need to keep business taxes low. You need to keep the codes simplified. And then as people make money and as really high-end people start to make money, top one percent, top one half of the top one percent, top one tenth of the top one percent, then we should capture that money as it comes in as income," Ryan said. "But let's keep business taxes simple and low, allow for growth, innovation, entrepreneurship, and figure out ways to steer it to areas that are not Silicon Valley or Wall Street to make sure that we can grow jobs in the industrial midwest."