Republican centrist Sen. Susan Collins said she has major concerns that need to be addressed before she will support Senate tax reform legislation, chief among them a trigger that would cause $26 billion in Medicare cuts.
The Maine Republican told reporters at a Christian Science Monitor breakfast Thursday that she is seeking assurances from Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell for a waiver of an automatic $26 billion cut to Medicare if the tax bill becomes law, according to a report in Roll Call.
Collins said she is worried that the bill would trigger automatic cuts under the 2010 Statutory Pay-As-You-Go law. The law requires spending cuts for various programs if the deficit reaches a certain level, and the Congressional Budget Office has estimated the tax bill would trigger $136 billion in cuts under the law.
She said Thursday that McConnell has given her assurances that a waiver of the pay-go trigger would be in another vehicle, according to Roll Call.
Collins has some other concerns, including the elimination of the state and local tax deduction in the Senate bill. She is seeking an amendment that mimics a House deal that would allow a property tax deduction of up to $10,000 to help blunt the elimination of the SALT deduction.
She also wants assurances that the Senate will take up two Obamacare stabilization bills to help nullify the impact of the repeal of the individual mandate, which is included in the Senate bill. One bill would fund Obamacare insurer payments for two years and another sponsored by Collins and Sen. Bill Nelson, D-Fla., would give states $4.5 billion in reinsurance funding to help Obamacare insurers cover their sickest medical claims.
However, the CBO said Wednesday that the bill to make Obamacare payments wouldn’t blunt the impact of repealing the mandate, which would raise premiums by 10 percent.
