Vice President Joe Biden acknowledged Thursday that he and President Barack Obama want to raise $1 trillion in taxes on the wealthy as part of a plan to let some Bush-era tax cuts expire, giving Republicans fresh fodder to criticize the Democratic ticket just days after the vice president said the middle class has been buried during the past four years.

“On top of the trillions of dollars in spending that we have already cut, we’re going to ask the wealthy to pay more. My heart breaks. Come on man,” Biden said, during a stop in the battleground state of Iowa.

Biden said Romney and other Republicans often say ‘Obama and Biden want to raise taxes by a trillion dollars.’ Guess what? Yes, we do in one regard: We want to let that trillion dollar tax cut expire so the middle class doesn’t have to bear the burden of all that money going to the super-wealthy. That’s not a tax raise. That’s called fairness where I come from.”

Ryan Williams, a spokesman for Romney, said Biden’s comment revealed an uncomfortable truth for Democrats.

“Fresh off admitting that America’s middle class has been ‘buried’ over the last four years, Vice President Biden went a step further today and fully embraced the president’s job-killing tax increases.

Read more on Newsmax.com: Biden: Romney Changed His Position on Tax Cut