Trump meets with House panel to talk up GOP tax plan

WASHINGTON -- President Donald Trump met with a bipartisan group of House Ways and Means Committee members on Tuesday, the day before he heads to Indiana to help unveil what he called a "very comprehensive, very detailed" framework for tax legislation.

Before the meeting, Trump said the plan, which has been kept under wraps by congressional leaders and White House officials, will simplify taxes, increase the child tax credit and cut taxes for the middle class "tremendously." Democrats have questioned -- on the basis of leaks that surfaced over the past week -- whether the plan's details wouldn't ultimately benefit top earners the most.

Trump said Tuesday that it was "time for both parties to come together" on taxes -- though a House Democratic aide said Tuesday's meeting doesn't signal any new agreements. Because the framework is probably already written and is scheduled for release today, the aide described Tuesday's meeting as pointless.

Lobbyists citing multiple leaks of the framework's elements said they include cutting the corporate tax rate to about 20 percent, down from 35 percent, and taking the top individual tax rate down to 35 percent from 39.6 percent.

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Administration officials have said they'd offset the rate cuts by eliminating deductions and other tax breaks.

Trump has been making a push to engage with Democrats on taxes, even as GOP congressional leaders have said they don't expect to have any Democratic support for the planned tax overhaul. Earlier this month, the president dined with three Democratic senators who are up for re-election next year in states Trump won to try to win their backing, and he has met with a bipartisan group of moderate House members.

Tuesday's meeting with more than a dozen members of the committee included Republican Rep. Kevin Brady of Texas, the panel's chairman; Rep. Richard Neal of Massachusetts, the panel's top Democrat; and Rep. Lloyd Doggett of Texas, a Democrat who's on the tax policy subcommittee.

"We want to underscore here that this is highly unlikely to result in a major bipartisan breakthrough on tax reform," Henrietta Treyz, a tax analyst with Veda Partners and former Senate tax staff member, said in a Monday research note. "Partisan rancor is alive and well on Capitol Hill at this point and the stage is not currently set for a bipartisan breakthrough in our estimation."

Doggett has called for the president to release his tax returns. Trump has departed from roughly 40 years of tradition for major-party presidential nominees by not making his returns public, saying his lawyers advised him not to while he's under audit.

Trump told dinner guests Monday that he expects the House will approve a tax bill in October and the Senate by year's end -- a rapid timeline that would give him a signature legislative achievement.

Brady also told reporters Monday that the goal was still to get a bill done by year's end. House Freedom Caucus Chairman Mark Meadows of North Carolina said Tuesday that Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin and National Economic Council Director Gary Cohn are still aiming for a tax bill to be signed by Thanksgiving -- a goal the House needs to work speedily to meet, Meadows said.

So far the lack of tax-plan details has frustrated some conservative Republicans, who have indicated they won't approve a budget -- a necessary step to pass a tax plan without Democratic support -- until they get some specifics from their leaders. Meadows said Tuesday that he'd only vote for a tax overhaul if it cuts the rate for corporations to 20 percent or lower and omits an international minimum tax, reduces the rate for pass-through entities -- where the businesses go untaxed but the owners pay up on the profits individually -- to at least 25 percent, and doubles the standard deduction for individuals.

Information for this article was contributed by Erik Wasson of Bloomberg News.

A Section on 09/27/2017

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