Two Boston city councilors are calling for the city to rescind Mayor Michelle Wu’s $43,000 raise and the Council’s tiered $21,500 raise and redirect that money to restore budget cuts amid a $70 million shortfall.

Councilors Erin Murphy and Ed Flynn plan to ask their colleagues to vote on a resolution Wednesday that aims to claw back the raise that went into effect in January for Mayor Wu and all three pay hikes — totaling $21,500 — that councilors have received to kick off the year since 2024.

The raises are tied to legislation passed by the City Council in 2022, that included language that prohibited pay hikes from becoming effective until the following mayoral election, which was last year, and council election, in the fall of 2023 — due to state ethics laws.

The mayor, who won reelection last November, saw her pay increase from $207,000 to $250,000 at the start of this year. Councilors, after receiving their latest raise at the same time, now make $125,000, compared to $120,000 last year, and $103,500 before their section of the bill took effect in January 2024. The mayor is typically paid twice as much as the Council.

“These salary increases are now fully in effect at a time when the City of Boston is facing difficult budgetary decisions impacting essential city services, front-line workers, and vulnerable residents,” Murphy and Flynn wrote. “Residents should not be asked to accept reductions to critical services while elected officials receive salary increases.”

Murphy and Flynn say the city’s elected officials shouldn’t be benefiting from higher salaries, while residents and city employees will soon be impacted by budget cuts, such as the $724,000 proposed cut to veterans’ services in the $4.9 billion budget that’s been proposed by Wu for next fiscal year.

The two councilors argue that, “during periods of fiscal uncertainty, elected officials have a responsibility to demonstrate shared sacrifice, fiscal discipline, and accountability to the people they serve.”

“Rescinding the salary of elected officials would send a clear message that the city’s priority must be preserving essential services, supporting frontline workers, protecting vulnerable residents, and investing in the people and programs that serve Boston neighborhoods,” Flynn and Murphy wrote.

“Any savings associated with rescinding these salary increases should be redirected toward preserving and strengthening essential city services, front-line workers, vulnerable residents, and nonprofit and community-based partners serving neighborhoods across Boston,” their resolution states.

The Council resolution states additional action would likely be needed to claw back raises, given that they have already gone into effect, such as the adoption of city legislation or a budget amendment.

Mayor Wu’s office shot back at Flynn and Murphy, who are seen as antagonists of the mayor, saying Tuesday that they’re welcome to give up their raises.

“If Councilors Flynn and Murphy believe they haven’t earned their full salaries, they are free to reject their raises,” city spokesperson Marcela Dwork said in a statement to the Herald. “Rather than directing non-binding resolutions to the city’s Human Resources Department and Office of Budget Management, the Council’s job is to exercise their powers to make direct changes to the budget through the amendment process before the June 10 deadline.”

The mayor’s office accused the councilors of flip-flopping on their prior calls to cut the city’s budget, by now calling for increased spending, in reference to efforts by some councilors to mobilize to reject the mayor’s budget to seek more funding. Wu has chastised those efforts as “fiscally irresponsible.”

Wu’s office said a budget requires tough choices, especially in difficult economic times, and said the councilors were choosing to avoid the tough choices — given that the Council’s authority to amend the budget, but not increase it, requires equivalent cuts to allow for increased spending elsewhere.

“We look forward to reviewing their amendment package,” Dwork said.

The remarks from the mayor’s office were not well-received by Flynn or Murphy, who voted against the 2022 raise package.

“This city was built on the back of military families and first responders,” Flynn said in a statement. “Unconscionable city cuts of 14% to veterans services and programs and cancer screening for firefighters are not ‘tough choices.’

“It’s an embarrassment,” added Flynn, a U.S. Navy veteran who served in Operation Enduring Freedom. “If that’s how we balance a budget now, we’ve abandoned our shared values and simply lost our way. The people of Boston don’t want petty politics or scapegoating. They need positive leadership.”

Murphy also pushed back.

“Residents are being asked to make tough choices, departments are being asked to absorb cuts, and city government should lead by example,” Murphy said in a statement. “Elected officials should not be insulated from the same economic realities facing the residents and departments we serve.

“I reject the suggestion that this is about whether I work hard or whether I have earned my salary,” Murphy added. “I voted against these raises in 2022 because I believed then, as I do now, that elected officials should lead by example. This is not about whether councilors work hard. It is about whether City Hall is willing to show the same restraint we are asking of everyone else.”

Councilor Ben Weber, a Wu ally who chairs the Ways and Means committee, said he intends to block the matter from coming to a vote Wednesday.

“I have already informed my colleagues that any resolutions about budget policy decisions would be sent to committee because these are topics we will discuss in our budget working sessions,” Weber said in a statement to the Herald. “Moreover, my understanding is that our salaries are set by ordinance so that their proposal would impact hard-working support staff only and that any savings would not be enough to make a difference.”

“This,” Weber said, “looks more like political theater.”

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