President Trump plans on celebrating the Republican tax bill‘s passage on Wednesday afternoon, when Congress could sweep away the argument that his administration will emerge from its first year without a substantive policy accomplishment.
It is unclear when exactly Trump will sign the tax cuts into law, but White House officials hope to cap off 2017 with a legislative victory this week that could overshadow the upheaval and controversy that marked much of their first year in power. The president’s allies have characterized tax reform as just the latest and largest campaign promise Trump has fulfilled in an effort to highlight the smaller achievements they say his administration has notched since Inauguration Day.
Senate Republicans passed the GOP tax bill just hours after House Republicans advanced the legislation on Tuesday. And although the House must vote again on the bill Wednesday morning due to a parliamentary snag, the tax cuts were expected to land on Trump’s desk before lawmakers head back to their districts for the Christmas holiday.
“For Trump, this is even bigger than it is for Republicans,” said Ford O’Connell, a GOP strategist. “For Trump, he’s delivering on a campaign promise … But also it shows that he can govern with the Democrats throwing everything, including the kitchen sink, at him.”
“At the end of the day, he was going against headwinds even within his own party,” O’Connell said.
White House officials expressed confidence after the Senate voted late Tuesday night that the Republican bill would deliver on Trump’s promise to boost the middle class with tax cuts.
“We are energized by the momentum behind our legislative effort to pass historic tax reform that delivers major tax cuts to hardworking middle-income families, simplifies the tax code and levels the playing field for American workers by giving the most competitive business tax rates in generations,” a White House official told the Washington Examiner.
“We also view the imminent final passage of this legislation as a major step forward toward advancing the goals of reforming our broken healthcare system due to Obamacare and to achieving energy independence through our actions on opening up [the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge],” the official added, referring to a provision in the tax package that will allow offshore drilling off the coast of Alaska. “We are confidently looking forward to building on these strong accomplishments in the coming year.”
Trump has long weathered criticism that his social media swagger would not translate easily into governing — a charge that gained more adherents after Republicans failed this summer to pass the healthcare reform he had championed and after courts delivered a series of setbacks to his immigration executive orders.
But the tax reform bill worked its way through Congress this fall with relative ease, and Trump served as its cheerleader every step of the way. Despite unanimous Democratic opposition and even some disagreements within the GOP, Trump and Republican congressional leaders managed to overcome the political and procedural hurdles that prevented the party from passing other legislative items and produce a bill that could survive the Senate’s unforgiving margin.
White House press secretary Sarah Sanders delayed the scheduled press briefing on Tuesday until after the House passed the tax reform bill, and she used the successful 227-203 vote to tick through a list of Trump’s other accomplishments before even mentioning the legislative victory that had occurred moments prior.
“As December winds down, I thought this would be a perfect opportunity to look back at what has been, by any measure, a historic year,” Sanders said before rattling off achievements ranging from immigration enforcement to deregulation.
“We’ve restored old alliances, forged new ones, begun rebuilding our military, and made it clear to the world that there is no greater ally, no more fearsome adversary than the United States of America,” Sanders said. “The president has delivered on promise after promise, issue after issue, time after time, and we’re just getting started.”
Trump announced a Wednesday news conference at the White House if the House passed the tax bill as planned, at “approximately” 1 p.m.
Brad Blakeman, a Republican strategist, said Trump’s signing of the tax reform bill will be a “big deal” for his presidency.
“The wind will be at his back heading into 2018, because this is big,” Blakeman said.
“This is the start. This is the beginning and not the end. It’s not the end of tax reform or deregulation,” Blakeman added. “It’s a harbinger of bigger things to come next year in 2018. And it’s not the only tax bill. The president and the Republicans understand that tweaks probably will have to be made and this isn’t the end-all with regard to taxes.”
Republicans have argued that the wage increases, job creation and economic growth created by their tax plan will ease its impact on the deficit and line the pockets of middle-class voters before they head to the polls in midterm elections next year.
Democrats, however, have claimed the bill primarily benefits wealthy Americans and corporations at the expense of lower-income families, who they say will suffer as a result of the future spending cuts they argue will be necessary to offset revenue loss.
O’Connell said the public’s overwhelmingly negative views toward the GOP tax plan could ultimately help it appear more successful.
“People have such low expectations of what’s in this bill that if it does half of what Republicans think … then they may be able to hold onto the House,” O’Connell said.
Recent polls have suggested the Republican tax plan enjoys low support among voters, many of whom remain skeptical that the bill will benefit them. For example, a Morning Consult/Politico poll made public on Tuesday found fewer than half of voters support the plan, while a CNN poll made public Tuesday found 55 percent of voters oppose the plan.
The perception that the Republican legislation will benefit only the rich has clung to the bill despite an analysis from the Tax Policy Center that found 80 percent of taxpayers will receive a tax cut next year under the new law.
White House officials declined to specify when Trump plans to sign the tax reform bill and the details about what kind of event he will host to commemorate the occasion.
