Trump Tax Cuts Are in Big Trouble

Speaker Mike Johnson told House Republicans behind closed doors Thursday that he is pursuing $1.5 trillion in spending cuts as part of the GOP’s party-line megabill, resulting in a smaller tax cuts package of $4 trillion.

The scaled-down component of President Donald Trump’s “big, beautiful bill” would present a huge challenge to House Republicans and their ability to include all of their priorities — not to mention the priorities of President Donald Trump — according to three people with direct knowledge of the speaker’s comments.

House Ways and Means Committee Republicans had been previously considering the $4 trillion tax package, as POLITICO first reported, as opposed to its original $4.5 trillion target.

Such a ceiling would also make it near impossible for House Republicans to make Trump’s expiring 2017 tax cuts permanent also while incorporating a host of Trump’s campaign promises. House Republicans have been planning for certain tax cuts and credits to sunset as a cost-saving mechanism.

Republicans had originally planned on tackling a $4.5 trillion tax package, but they’d need to hit $2 trillion in spending cuts to make it happen after hard-liners secured a key provision in the budget resolution setting parameters for the party-line legislation. Since that time, House GOP leadership has continued to face pressure from deficit hawks to adhere to this agreement.

But after long-fought battles over cuts to food programs in the Agriculture Committee and Medicaid in the Energy and Commerce Committee, it’s become clear to party leaders that they’ll only able to muster $1.5 trillion in spending cuts. And they’re still scrambling to hit that number as it is.

“There is no way we’re going to hit $2 trillion,” said one senior GOP aide.

If House Republican find less than $2 trillion, then they have to reduce the amount of tax cuts dollar for dollar.

Some lawmakers suspected Johnson might forge ahead with a $4.5 trillion tax bill, anyway, and then try to steamroll hardliners on the floor. However, 32 fiscal conservatives wrote a letter to Johnson and House Majority Leader Steve Scalise on Wednesday demanding that leadership maintain the linkage between tax cuts and spending cuts.

Leadership can only afford to lose a tiny handful of members still be able to pass the bill central to enacting Trump’s domestic policy agenda.