Trump and his aides have sent mixed signals about an idea that runs counter to decades of Republican orthodoxy.
President Donald Trump’s last-minute push to raise taxes on the wealthiest Americans is running into a buzz saw of opposition in the Republican Party, where such proposals have long been anathema.
As congressional Republicans assemble a massive tax-and-spending-cut package to deliver on Trump’s domestic policy agenda, the White House has been kicking around the idea of allowing the tax rate on top earners to go up as a way to pay for other priorities on taxes, immigration and the military without cutting programs like Medicaid that millions of Americans rely on.
But the proposal received swift pushback from Republicans behind the scenes this week, raising doubts about whether it will appear in the party’s final package.
Trump — who has sent mixed signals on the matter over the past few weeks — floated the idea of bumping the top rate for those making at least $2.5 million annually from 37% to 39.6% during a phone call with House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., on Wednesday, as NBC News previously reported.
In a Truth Social post on Friday, Trump said that he would “graciously accept” a “‘TINY’ tax increase for the RICH,” while also warning of potential attacks from Democrats. He said Republicans should “probably not do it” but that he would be “OK” if they did.
And later Friday, Trump said it he thought it was "good politics" to raise taxes on the wealthy "to benefit people who are lower income."
“But I don’t think they’re going to be doing it," he said.
Grover Norquist, the president of Americans for Tax Reform, told NBC News that Trump called him on Wednesday to seek his input on a tax hike for top earners. Norquist said he pushed back hard on the proposal, citing both economic and political reasons.
“I gave him my sense of why I thought any discussion of increasing rates was a bad idea: because it would kill jobs, it is damaging to small businesses, nobody in the campaign ever discussed this as an option,” Norquist said. “The other part is, the entire Republican Party is against it.”
Norquist said Trump sounded receptive to his argument, and that the president even raised the example of how President George H.W. Bush suffered politically for backtracking on his infamous 1988 campaign pledge, “Read my lips: no new taxes.” Trump also referenced Bush’s pledge in his Friday Truth Social post.
The idea of a tax rate increase also did not go over well with Republicans on Capitol Hill, although they entertained the idea following Trump’s call with Johnson on Wednesday. House and Senate GOP leadership — which has long been resistant toward raising the top tax rate — communicated to lawmakers and aides by Thursday evening that there aren’t enough votes for a tax hike on the wealthy, according to four GOP sources familiar with the matter.
Johnson and Trump spoke again by phone on Thursday, according to Norquist as well as a GOP source familiar with the call.
Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., said Friday that Republicans are “all about lowering taxes.”
“I don’t want to see taxes go up on anyone. … But the president, he’s not a conventional president. People didn’t vote for a conventional president, and I think his policies reflect that,” Thune said on CNBC’s "Squawk Box." “This all starts in the House of Representatives, they’re going to have to figure out how to dial this.”
There’s also some confusion among Republicans about how serious Trump is about a plan to raise taxes on the wealthy. Two weeks ago, Trump had publicly shot down the idea of a tax increase on millionaires.
https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/co...y-quickly-runs-gop-resistance-rcna205864
