The Heating, Air-conditioning and Refrigeration Distributors International (HARDI) joined over 35 industry groups and advocacy organizations supporting House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Dave Camp (R-Michigan) and Congressman Kevin Brady’s (R-Texas) recent calls for a vote this year on Brady’s “Death Tax Repeal Act,” HR 2429. The Family Business Coalition, of which HARDI is a member, sent the letter to Reps. Brady and Camp as well as House leadership.

The letter states in part, “We believe that full repeal of the death tax is the only permanent solution for America’s family businesses and farms and applaud your efforts to bring this important issue to the floor for the first time in over nine years. Our member family business owners across the country deserve to see where their elected representatives stand on death tax repeal.”

HARDI government affairs co-chair Karen Madonia of Illco Inc. (Aurora, Illinois), who was one of two business owners who participated at a press conference introducing the bill last year, stated regarding the bill “What the authors and supporters of this bill clearly understand, and what I hope that members of both houses can embrace, is that the estate tax presents a real problem for family-owned companies.”

HARDI has been working with coalition partners for over two years to bring a House vote to fruition and members have been active in helping the bill gain support in the form of co-sponsors

The estate tax made recent news when Brady’s Death Tax Repeal Act surpassed 218 bipartisan co-sponsors needed to reach a majority of the House of Representatives. Sen. John Thune (R-South Dakota) carries the mirror bill in the U.S. Senate with 37 co-sponsors.