Former President Donald Trump has been floating so many tax cuts in this year’s campaign that it almost feels like he is channeling Oprah Winfrey’s famous “you get a car” moment. Except Trump is telling voters, “You get a tax cut! You get a tax cut! And you get a tax cut!”
In recent months, Trump has said he wants to end taxes on tips, overtime pay and Social Security benefits, and get rid of limits on federal deductions for state and local taxes.
They all have a price tag — and budget watchdogs say it’s a hefty one.
“Trump’s tax cut promises now surpass $8.5 trillion over a decade,” said Erica York of the Tax Foundation.
Trump’s newest proposal would repeal something he signed into law in 2017 — a $10,000 cap on how much taxpayers can deduct in state and local taxes.
The SALT deduction cap won praise from budget watchdog groups for being tax reform, even as it was effectively a tax increase on upper-income earners in high tax states like California, New Jersey and New York.
“Such a repeal would be costly, regressive and bad tax policy,” said the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget.
Getting rid of those SALT deduction limits would cost around $100 billion a year — or about $1 trillion over the next decade.
Why did Trump suddenly embrace that SALT plan? One could argue it’s a late effort to help GOP lawmakers in suburban areas of New York who won U.S. House seats in 2022 but who might not survive this November. The SALT promise gives them something to campaign on.
There certainly is nothing wrong with proposing tax cuts. But when you keep reducing the revenue coming in for Uncle Sam — and don’t cut spending — the deficits go up.
Trump’s fiscal record went completely against the grain for Republicans in Congress, as he ran up nearly $8 trillion in new debt during his four years in office.
Most Republicans probably would scoff at this, but budget groups right now forecast Vice President Kamala Harris as much more fiscally responsible than Trump. But let’s be honest: Neither one is anywhere close to offering a plan with a balanced budget.
No matter what, big decisions are ahead on tax policy. All of the individual tax cuts approved under Trump will expire after 2025, meaning that Congress — and the next president — will have major decisions to make on the tax code.
And not everyone can get a tax cut.
Jamie Dupree has covered national politics and Congress from Washington, D.C., since the Reagan administration. His column appears weekly in The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. For more, check out his Capitol Hill newsletter at jamiedupree.substack.com
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