Sen. Thune opposes $15 minimum wage hike

RAPID CITY, S.D. (KOTA) - South Dakota Senator John Thune is voicing his opposition to raising the national minimum wage to $15 an hour on Wednesday.

The senator tweeted that he made $6 an hour working at a restaurant as a “kid.” His view falls in line with congressional Republican opposition to the Democrats’ proposal to raise the minimum wage federally. Republicans say a wage hike will harm small businesses that have already been economically harmed during the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic.

Republicans say a wage hike will harm small businesses that have already been economically harmed during the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic.

I started working by bussing tables at the Star Family Restaurant for $1/hour & slowly moved up to cook – the big leagues for a kid like me– to earn $6/hour. Businesses in small towns survive on narrow margins. Mandating a $15 minimum wage would put many of them out of business. pic.twitter.com/izQDOGRAH1
— Senator John Thune (@SenJohnThune) February 24, 2021

“I started working by bussing tables at the Star Family Restaurant for $1/hour & slowly moved up to cook – the big leagues for a kid like me– to earn $6/hour,” Thune wrote in a Wednesday evening tweet. “Businesses in small towns survive on narrow margins. Mandating a $15 minimum wage would put many of them out of business.”

On Monday, Republican Senators Tom Cotton of Arkansas and Mitt Romney of Utah introduced a $10 national minimum wage plan. It is called the Higher Wages for American Workers Act. The GOP plan would gradually raise the federal minimum wage from its current rate of $7.25 an hour to $10 an hour by 2025.

The plan was criticized by Democratic legislators and others for being lower than the minimum wage in Cotton’s home state—$11 an hour.