Congress
Scalise says SALT talks already kicking off
House Majority Leader Steve Scalise said that Republicans were negotiating on Tuesday over how to accommodate concerns about the state and local tax deduction that could be an obstacle to a sweeping tax package next year.
“We need to address this problem,” said Scalise (R-La.) of the contingent of House Republicans from California, New Jersey and New York who have been adamant about lifting the $10,000 cap on the deduction for state income and property taxes, known as SALT in tax parlance. “They’re coming back.”
A spokesperson for Scalise did not immediately respond to a request about which lawmakers were participating in the meetings.
The early negotiations signal just how challenging House Republican leadership expects it to be to muster the votes for an anticipated reconciliation bill next year, which could be passed without Democratic support. Republicans want to use the legislation to extend trillions of dollars in expiring tax cuts that President-elect Donald Trump and his allies in Congress pushed through in 2017, during Trump’s first term.
And the most difficult part for leadership promises to be those pro-SALT Republicans, who held up a tax package earlier this spring over demands that it include some form of relief from the cap. The limit was imposed to offset some of the cost of the 2017 cuts – and ding blue states that have high taxes.
Tuesday morning, Rep. Michael Lawler (R-N.Y.) reaffirmed those demands, telling Blue Light News that he’s made it “abundantly clear” that any future tax packages will need to address SALT.
In remarks made at a panel hosted by the Business Roundtable and the American Petroleum Institute, Scalise said that he reminded incoming Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.) that such demands from Republicans in high-tax states could be a significant challenge in the House.
“I reminded him, because he wasn’t part of it last time around in the top leadership, that our challenge in the House is much different,” Scalise said. The Senate GOP “doesn’t have a single SALT state member. There’s five states that are really affected by SALT, and New York and New Jersey were the most vocal,”
“We had over 30 members from those states,” Scalise said of 2017. “By the way we still have close to that today.”
For now, negotiations over taxes are mired in an ongoing strategic debate over whether to do two reconciliation bills, addressing border and energy policies first and taxes later, or enact all of the Republicans’ policy priorities together.
Still, there are plenty of Republicans who detest the idea of raising the SALT cap because they believe it unfairly benefits wealthy taxpayers in high-tax states.
“We’ve got people on both ends, Republicans and Democrats who don’t like it,” said House Ways and Means committee member Kevin Hern (R-Okla.).
Senate Majority Leader John Thune said he is confident Sen. Markwayne Mullin will be confirmed as the next secretary of Homeland Security despite a contentious exchange with fellow GOP Sen. Rand Paul at a hearing Wednesday.
Paul, the chair of the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, sharply questioned the Oklahoma senator about past remarks that he “understood” why Paul suffered a heinous assault from a neighbor in 2017. Mullin refused to apologize for the remark.
“Those two obviously have some history, and it’s, you know, personal stuff,” Thune said. “They’ve got to work through it. I mean, in the end, this is about the job, and it’s about making sure that we got the right person there. I think Markwayne is the right person for the job.”
Asked if he was still confident Mullin can be confirmed, Thune said, “Yeah.”
Paul has scheduled a committee vote on Mullin for Thursday. While Paul’s vote is in serious doubt, Mullin could win over Democratic Sen. John Fetterman of Pennsylvania, who has expressed support for Mullin previously and said Wednesday he would approach the nomination “with an open mind.”
“I haven’t been rocked by some mic-dropping kind of moments,” Fetterman told reporters after the hearing.
Sen. Markwayne Mullin said he regretted calling Alex Pretti “deranged” but stopped short of offering a direct apology to Pretti’s family.
“I shouldn’t have said that,” the Oklahoma Republican said during his confirmation hearing Wednesday to serve as the next Homeland Security secretary. He was referring to his past comments regarding the U.S. citizen killed by federal immigration enforcement agents in Minnesota back in January, who some conservatives in the immediate aftermath labeled a “domestic terrorist.”
It was a stronger concession than Mullin gave just moments earlier, when he refused to apologize for calling Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.), the chair of the Homeland Security and Government Affairs Committee, a “snake.” Still, when pressed by the committee’s top Democrat, Sen. Gary Peters of Michigan, Mullin would not commit to apologizing to Pretti’s family until the conclusion of an investigation into the incident.
“If I’m proven wrong, then I will,” Mullin said.
Regarding Renee Good, another U.S. citizen killed by immigration enforcement officers in Minnesota earlier this year, Mullin refused to retract comments he made at the time of Good’s death, specifically that agents were justified in killing her. He told BLN in January that agents “had the right to defend themselves.”
He said he would wait for the findings of the investigation into Good’s killing to comment further; Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.) countered that the Trump administration is currently blocking state and local inquiries.
A committee vote on Sen. Markwayne Mullin’s confirmation as Homeland Security secretary remains on track for Thursday despite a fiery sparring session Wednesday between the Oklahoma Republican and Sen. Rand Paul of Kentucky, the chair of the panel that must approve his nomination.
A spokesperson for Paul said after the tense exchange — during which Mullin refused to apologize for comments saying he “understood” why Paul was violently assaulted in 2017 — that the committee vote “is on for tomorrow.”
As chair of the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, Paul has wide latitude to schedule action on Mullin’s nomination.
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