Rhode Island
Hasbro HQ vs. RIPTA funding: What’s at stake under a potential tax on R.I.’s top earners • Rhode Island Current
While Gov. Dan McKee pledged to not raise taxes during his 2025 State of the State address, a crowd of progressive advocates gathered a floor below him rallied for higher taxes on the state’s top earners.
The perennial push to bring a millionaire’s tax to Rhode Island got off to an earlier and more fiery beginning than usual this year. Not surprising, given what’s at stake on both sides of the debate.
To proponents, the tax policy offers a crucial way to boost state revenues, staving off cuts to social services, public transit and health care amid projections of a $223 million structural deficit for the fiscal year that starts July 1. Legislation proposing an extra tax on the top 1% of state earners is slated to be introduced in both chambers this week.
Equally stalwart in their opposition, naysayers insist the tax will cause employers and wealthy residents to seek tax-friendlier pastures.
Including Hasbro Inc. The Pawtucket-based toy and gaming empire is considering a move to Massachusetts, citing the stronger talent pool and access to amenities that Rhode Island lacks.
The absence of a millionaire’s tax, though, is one way the Ocean State can still compete against its northern neighbor, which began a 4% surtax on income over $1 million in 2023.
“It’s a competitive advantage,” House Speaker K. Joseph Shekarchi said, speaking to reporters after Gov. Dan McKee’s State of the State address on Jan. 14. “I think the governor is using that to keep Hasbro and the Hasbro workers in Rhode Island.”
Hasbro did not return multiple inquiries for comment. Company executives have never mentioned state income taxes in publicly released emails or investors’ calls regarding potential relocation plans.
But it’s clear to Laurie White that the company’s calculus on whether to stay or go hinges on costs associated with doing business — including income taxes.
“It’s about two things: access to talent and the cost structure,” White, president of the Greater Providence Chamber of Commerce, said in an interview. “We can’t compete 1-to-1 with Massachusetts on the talent basis. But on taxes, that’s a consideration.”
Rhode Island lacks the appeal of states like New Hampshire or Florida, which don’t tax personal income at all. But it managed to edge out Massachusetts for the first time in a decade last year, in a ranking of state business tax climates by the Tax Foundation.
Rhode Island ranked 41st among states with the most business-friendly tax policies, while Massachusetts fell to 46th. The report cited Massachusetts’ millionaire’s tax as a key reason for its lower ranking compared with past years.
“We do not want to lose that momentum,” Olivia DaRocha, a spokesperson for McKee, said in an email. She also raised an oft-cited argument among opponents of wealth taxes: that states that raise taxes see their top-earners move elsewhere.
A separate Jan. 7 analysis by the Tax Foundation linked lower state income taxes to where people moved within the United States in fiscal year 2024.
The Commonwealth saw the sixth-largest net loss in residents in fiscal 2024, losing .39% of its population, based on an analysis of U.S. Census Bureau data. Rhode Island’s population shrank ever-so-slightly, down .03%, according to the report.
“Rhode Island should learn a lesson from its neighbor to the north about targeting residents’ incomes,” Katherine Loughead, senior policy analyst and research manager for the Tax Foundation, said in an interview. “Rhode Island is already trending in the wrong direction. Outbound migration could be expected to get considerably worse if Rhode Island was to adopt a significant tax increase.”
Not so, according to Alan Krinsky, director of research and fiscal policy for The Economic Progress Institute, which has supported a Rhode Island millionaire’s tax. Ahead of a forthcoming Institute research paper on the “tax migration myth,” Krinsky poked holes in the Tax Foundation’s analysis.
For one thing, Massachusetts was already losing residents at a similar clip even before voters approved the millionaire’s tax. Also noteworthy to Krinsky are the sizes of population swings, which range from .65% loss in Hawaii to 1.26% gain in South Carolina.
“That’s hardly a mass exodus,” Krinsky said.

Meanwhile, other studies suggest taxes hold little sway over where people move. New York saw the number of millionaire households increase by 17,500 from 2020 to 2022, despite imposing a higher tax on income over $1.1 million during that time period, according to a December 2023 report by the Fiscal Policy Institute. Residents who earned over $850,000 a year were less likely to move out of state than people in lower-income brackets, the report found.
Loughead acknowledged that taxes are just one factor in a complex decision of where to move: cost-of-living, particularly housing costs, also plays an important role. New England overall has seen its population decline because of a higher median age and migration to southern states.
Fiscal and policy experts largely agree it’s too early to draw conclusions from Massachusetts’ tax on millionaires. Initial state estimates predicted a $2.2 billion revenue boost from the surtax in fiscal 2024. The Massachusetts Department of Revenue projected $2.4 billion revenue from the tax in fiscal 2026 budget projections, according to news reports.
Less abstract than future forecasts about revenue and population are the financial woes facing the Rhode Island Public Transit Authority, hospitals, and social services. All the more reason, Krinsky said, to consider a surtax on top earners.
Rep. Karen Alzate, a Pawtucket Democrat, plans to introduce legislation this week calling for a 3% surtax on the top 1% of state earners. Preliminary number-crunching suggests that, if approved, the tax would bring in $190 million in revenue per year, affecting residents with net taxable income of $650,000 or more.
Alzate, who introduced similar, though not identical legislation last year, hoped the looming budget deficit might make previous critics take a fresh look at her proposal.
“This is the year to do it,” she said. “We are facing a real deficit and we cannot afford to cut social services and education.”
McKee’s initial fiscal 2026 spending plan did not include higher taxes on top earners. Senate President Dominick Ruggerio has already signaled his opposition. Shekarchi pledged to remain open to all ideas.
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Rhode Island
ACLU of RI sues McKee alleging denial of access to regularly used State House rally area | ABC6
PROVIDENCE, R.I. (WLNE) — Attorneys for the ACLU of Rhode Island have filed a lawsuit against RI Governor Dan McKee, alleging the governor’s office explicitly told state and capitol police to bar protesters from accessing the State House rotunda and upper floors.
The rally was planned to take place in the rotunda an hour before McKee’s January 2025 State of the State address.
The event was to be attended by local groups including Rhode Island Homeless Advocacy Project and by activist Harrison Tuttle.
Tuttle was the President of the now dissolved Rhode Island Black Lives Matter PAC at the time.
The suit claims that Tuttle and fellow protesters arrived to be told that McKee’s office instructed police from letting them enter.
Tuttle was told by police that he in particular was not allowed to enter the areas, according to the suit.
The suit also claims that other people were allowed to access those areas of the State House.
The suit states that the rotunda is commonly used by protesters, and that its entrance was blocked off by capitol and state police.
A sign accompanied the officers that said the rotunda was reserved from 4:30-10 p.m., and the governor’s office didn’t reserve the area until 4:39 p.m., according to records cited by the ACLU of RI.
The protesters were directed by police to the “Bell Room” for their event, which is a less visible area in the back of the State House’s first floor, according to the suit.
The ACLU of RI statement reads in part:
In any event, despite being ‘reserved,’ the rotunda was not used for any purpose during that timeframe. The lawsuit argues that the Governor’s reservation of the space and the Capitol and State Police’s actions were undertaken to stifle the protesters’ exercise of their First Amendment rights to freedom of speech and freedom of assembly.
Executive director of the Rhode Island Homeless Advocacy Project Eric Hirsch, a participant in the suit stated:
I’ve been advocating for an end to homelessness in Rhode Island for a long time. I was shocked to see the Rotunda at the Statehouse roped off when I arrived for the People’s State of the State rally. I had attended dozens of rallies there over the years. To make matters worse, we were also prevented from getting anywhere near the Governor’s address. We were confined to a lower floor of the Statehouse. This is unacceptable. We have a right to express our view of the Governor’s policies toward people experiencing homelessness.
ABC6 has reached out to the office of Governor Dan McKee for comment in this matter but has not yet heard back.
Rhode Island
RI GOP asking for resident input for upcoming Washington Bridge oversight hearing | ABC6
PROVIDENCE, R.I. (WLNE) — Rhode Island Republican leaders are asking for public input ahead of an upcoming oversight hearing on the Washington Bridge forensic report.
The report, recently revealed to have been withheld by Governor Dan McKee at attorneys’ advice, will be the subject of the planned November 13 oversight hearing.
McKee stated that he knew that repairs were needed on the bridge for two years before its December 11, 2023 westbound side closure, but was confident that work was underway.
McKee said that once he was aware the bridge deficiencies were irreparable, he approved the closure.
Rhode Island House Minority Leader Michael Chippendale said in a statement, in part:
Now that the Speaker and Senate President have committed to ‘a thorough and rigorous examination’ of the Washington Bridge failure and have empowered the Joint Oversight Committee to take testimony under oath, Rhode Islanders deserve answers without delay on this on-going administrative disaster.
Residents can contribute questions to the hearing process via email at rigopcaucus@gmail.com.
Rhode Island
Smithfield’s response to anti-Semitic hazing incident is ‘egregious,’ Jewish Alliance says
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The mother of a Jewish football player told the Jewish Alliance of Greater Rhode Island that five Smithfield football players, all seniors, trapped her son in a bathroom and sprayed him with Lysol while yelling anti-Jewish slurs, according to a representative of the alliance.
The Alliance staff member, Stephanie Hague, says the woman told her the entrapment involved a chair pushed against a door, but it wasn’t clear from the woman’s comments if her son was trapped in a bathroom, or in a particular area of a bathroom.
Hague said she could not further clarify the specific circumstances of the Lysol-spraying but as she understood it, the player was exposed to the spray during the entrapment and other hazing.
Did the Smithfield football players use anti-Semitic slurs?
“The reason I am not sharing the slurs is because they are, one, not suitable for print, but also because there is some dispute of exactly the phrasing,” said the Alliance’s president, Adam Greenman.
“But we do know that they were anti-Jewish, anti-Semitic slurs and the incident was witnessed by 20 other football players,” Greenman added.
Hague said that Greenman’s comment is “correct.” She emphasized that she is not a lawyer or police investigator, but as part of her job at the Alliance, she responds to matters of antisemitism.
Greenman said the organization has talked to the student’s mother and to others who witnessed what took place.
“We feel fairly confident that we understand the details of what happened,” he said.
Alliance putting public focus on district’s response to the incident
Hague and Greenman made those comments on Monday, Oct. 27 as the student’s mother and the Jewish Alliance made plans to bring attention to the situation at an anticipated meeting of Smithfield’s school committee.
Both the Alliance and the Sandra Bornstein Holocaust Education Center have condemned the school district’s handling of the incident, asserting that five seniors were initially kicked off the team but were then reinstated to the team on Wednesday, Oct. 22.
The players’ return to the team was in time to participate in Friday night’s game against Exeter-West Greenwich/Prout, which the team won 16-6.
On Thursday, Oct. 23, the school district’s Superintendent Dawn Bartz, gave a one-sentence statement in an email seeking comment on the situation: “The disciplinary process has concluded, and we will not be discussing details involving students.”
“The fact that the school district has reversed course on consequences for the students is just egregious,” Greenman said.
“We all know that if a consequence is taken away for something like this, it encourages that behavior moving forward,” he said. “We’re very concerned that the students involved were reinstated. We’re very concerned that it seems like the school district is not taking this seriously.”
Meeting canceled hours after Jewish Alliance encourages public attendance
Later on Monday, it became clear that Smithfield Town Council had canceled its Tuesday, Oct. 28, joint session with the School Committee.
An executive assistant to the town manager in Smithfield confirmed that the meeting had been canceled, noting that there are plans to reschedule the meeting, but no date has been set at this time.
The town clerk later said that based on the volume of queries from members the public and news media, the town determined it needed to move the joint meeting from the Town Council’s chambers to a larger venue, according to Donna Corrao, who is an executive assistant for Town Manager Robert W. Seltzer.
The cancellation came hours after the Alliance sent a press release encouraging the public to attend the meeting to “express your outrage and desire to act” after a “horrific antisemitic hazing incident at Smithfield High School.”
The Alliance had encouraged people to:
- Attend in support and solidarity
- Share brief testimony if you have a strong connection to Smithfield or a compelling personal experience to contribute
- Hold signs and wear pins, which would have been available at the meeting.
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