Murphy backs $25 minimum wage bill

Senate Murphy backs $25 minimum wage bill Comments: by Ashleigh Fields - 06/28/26 1:35 PM ET Comments: Link copied by Ashleigh Fields - 06/28/26 1:35 PM ET Comments: Link copied

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Sen. Chris Murphy (D-Conn.) on Sunday touted his minimum wage bill that aims to gradually increase worker pay from $7.25 to $25 hourly.

“I think our party should have bigger ideas. I put one on the table last week, a $25 minimum wage. And I think we do have to have answers for the way in which corporations and billionaires are taking over and corrupting our politics,” Murphy said during an appearance on NBC’s “Meet the Press.”

“So I do think that there is somewhat of a trend that candidates who are confronting concentrated corporate power in a meaningful way are winning. And I think that that is something that the Democratic Party should pay attention to,” he added.

Murphy introduced the Living Wage For All Act on Thursday, which would implement a $25 federal wage floor by 2032, while giving other businesses until 2039 to do so. Pay would increase from $7.25 to $12.00 in the first year.

The legislation coincides with a longtime push for Democrats to regain support from working class voters, amid their shift towards the Republican party in the 2024 presidential election.

“It’s not like we can’t pay a $25 minimum wage, we just choose not to because we’ve become okay with dozens and dozens of people in this country making hundreds of billions of dollars,” Murphy told guest host Ryan Nobles.

“So this is the kind of idea that shows that the Democratic Party is ready to fundamentally change this economy. And I think this is the kind of idea that brings Trump voters over,” he added.

The Connecticut senator isn’t the first to back a measure geared toward improving wages.

Last year, Rep. Bobby Scott (D-Va.) and Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) introduced the Raise the Wage Act in both chambers urging lawmakers to increase the minimum wage to $17 per hour by 2030.

The bill is currently under review by the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions.

Data from the Congressional Budget Office warns that any fast increase could cause low-wage workers to become jobless but endorsed plans to raise the federal minimum wage to $17 by 2029 and gradually raise the subminimum wage for tipped workers to be the same as the regular minimum wage.

Murphy has urged Democrats to take on corporate power, give unions more power and improve conditions for the working class to pick up factionless voters ahead of midterm elections.

“I don’t argue that the Democratic Party should change our views when it comes to issues like guns, or climate, or abortion. I just think that we have to accept into the coalition people that may have voted for Donald Trump, and want a party that is going to unrig the democracy, but may not be ready to join us on all of our social and cultural views. We should give them a place in our party,” he told Nobles.

“And I think the only way that we give them that place is by being stronger in the way that we confront the consolidation of corporate power in this country,” Murphy added.

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