President Donald Trump is expected to begin fleshing out his plans for a tax cuts this week, and the administration is far into negotiations with Republican leaders in Congress on the effort.
If President Trump remains determined to reform the tax code and can’t do so with Republican votes alone, what options does he have? Hints are already starting to emerge from the president’s meeting Tuesday with a handful of Democratic senators. Plenty of Republicans on Capitol Hill are already angry at the president for cutting a deal with House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer on keeping the government funded and increasing the debt ceiling.
Meanwhile, Schumer and Sen. Ron Wyden, an Oregon Democrat, have united most of their caucus behind a demand that any tax reform not only go through the normal procedure, rather than reconciliation, but that it also not benefit the top 1 percent of taxpayers or add to the deficit. Pelosi and members of her caucus in the House have taken a similar stance, and as such, Democrats are specifically criticizing plans to repeal the estate tax and the possibility of eliminating deductions widely used by the middle class. They’re not saying no to tax cuts, just demanding that they be paid for and actually benefit people who need the help. That may not fly with most Republicans in Congress.
If we’ve learned anything about Trump so far, it’s that he’s much more interested in being able to claim victory than he is about the details of policy. There’s a path for him to do that on tax reform if he is willing to work with the center of both parties. He can notch a win, and so can the vast majority of the American people.