President Trump’s promise of a 10 percent tax cut for the middle class this year appears to be fading almost as quickly as it came.
The Republican chairman of the congressional committee with authority over tax policy, Rep. Kevin Brady, R-Texas, suggested Monday that congressional follow-through on the tax cut could be limited to a merely symbolic gesture, though he tried to keep hope alive for next year.
“But really what the president was referring to — and I wish some of his critics would have just simply asked — what he was talking about was when best do we introduce either the bill or a nonbinding resolution laying out our commitment, as Republicans, to doing that,” Brady said in an interview with Fox Business News.
[Opinion: Trump’s middle-class tax cut election surprise]
A nonbinding resolution is a symbolic vote for Congress to take without changing law.
Brady also indicated that the resolution may not receive a vote during this current Congress.
The Texas Republican said he aims to introduce a resolution “in the next month or so,” though he hedged on that possibility.
“But in truth, the lame duck is so unpredictable — that period between the election and the end of the Congress,” Brady said during Monday’s interview. “And really, common sense tells you this is something that, as Republicans retain the House and Senate, that we’ll advance in the new Congress.”
It’s the latest development related to Trump’s promise to deliver a loosely defined tax cut that few expect to become reality, one which appeared to surprise congressional leaders.
Trump told reporters nine days ago that he had a mystery tax cut coming before the midterm elections. He then promised that a resolution would be introduced this week to cut taxes further. That would require Congress to hold an emergency session and draft potentially detailed legislation the week before Election Day, a prospect seen by congressional and tax policy observers as, at best, unrealistic.
In order for Republicans to circumvent a filibuster in the Senate and pass the legislation along party lines, they would also need to pass a budget for this year. But that budget would need to be changed in order to accommodate a tax cut the size Trump’s proposing, which would necessitate painstaking cuts be made throughout the federal budget. Making those before an election could hurt Republican chances at maintaining control of the House of Representatives and Senate.
Asked about whether the White House had requested legislative language to accommodate the significant tax cut, as Republicans used to enact last year’s cuts into law, Claire Burghoff, Republican spokesperson for the House Budget Committee, told the Washington Examiner in an email last week, “No.”
Burghoff pointed to the budget resolution that the committee already passed in June, which doesn’t include language necessary to advance new tax cuts.
Early estimates of the size of Trump’s tax cut in the federal budget are $2 trillion over 10 years, which would require major cuts to federal programs, far beyond what that budget calls for, in order to avoid increasing the deficit. Democrats, and many Republicans, would resist cuts of that nature, depending on where they come from.
Trump’s mystery tax cut has already changed much in its short life so far, even before Monday’s suggestion that it might be a symbolic resolution.
A White House spokesperson said last week that Trump wanted the 10 percent cut to be included in a “Tax Reform 2.0” package that passed the House roughly along party lines last month. That package would make permanent the temporary individual tax cuts and changes that Republicans enacted last year, but is not expected to become law or receive a vote in the Senate. Trump then contradicted his press office a day later in an interview with the Wall Street Journal, saying that it would be a resolution, though he was unclear on specifics.
Trump also told reporters last week that his proposed new tax cut might be “revenue neutral,” a term that means it would not add to the deficit. But White House officials were not able to explain what he meant.
A spokesperson for Kevin Hassett, the chairman of the president’s Council of Economic Advisers who Trump said would have more information, suggested in response to an inquiry that the tax cut would take shape away from the public eye.
“The President led the debate on [last year’s tax overhaul] and the White House worked behind the scenes with the Hill on the details; this new 10 percent proposed cut is the same strategy,” the spokesperson emailed. “[W]e are analyzing the possible avenues that could achieve the tax relief with revenue neutrality, and we look forward to continuing to work with Chairman Brady and Congress on this important issue.”
