| | | | |  | | By Sarah Ferris | Presented by Wells Fargo | With assists from POLITICO’s Congress team
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Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-Wash.) speaks with reporters outside the U.S. Capitol May 17, 2024. (Francis Chung/POLITICO via AP Images) | AP | DEMS’ BIG 2025 TAX DILEMMA GOP leaders wanted to buoy the base with their 2025 tax agenda, but it had another unintended benefit for them, too: Forcing Democrats to reckon with their looming dilemma over Donald Trump’s expiring tax cuts. Hill Democrats are already split over next year’s massive tax cliff, and the fight will likely start spilling out into the open soon. As long as the party controls at least one chamber of Congress — and especially if President Joe Biden keeps the White House — Democrats will need to be at the table to renew any tax cuts. Enter, fed-up progressives. Liberal leaders say Democrats should be willing to let all the 2017 tax cuts all lapse, rather than potentially greenlighting more freebies for the rich with crumbs for typical Americans in return. “Obviously we’d like to keep the pieces that are good, but they’re tiny,” Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-Wash.), who leads the Congressional Progressive Caucus, told us. “ So, I think if it came down to getting rid of all of them, versus keeping that, we would get rid of all of them.” She’s not alone. Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) offered a more blunt message in a speech last week about the upcoming tax fight: “Democrats don’t need to be suckers this time.” It’s not so simple for Biden. If he holds onto the White House, Biden has already vowed he would “extend all middle-class tax cuts” in the 2025 fight. But he’s also suggested that he’d let at least some key pieces expire, prompting Republican accusations that he’s levying one of the largest tax increases in American history. And we’re told business-friendly groups are already privately pressuring some Hill Democrats to keep certain pieces of the law. Democrats are just kicking off formal talks. Senate Finance and House Ways and Means panels have begun internal conversations, with more to come. The Progressive Caucus, whose leadership has already been briefed by groups like the Groundwork Collaborative, will have caucus-wide briefings in the coming weeks. And the economic-focused New Democrat Coalition will have its own meetings on the subject in July. This headache is exactly how the GOP designed the bill. Republicans knew the expiring tax cuts — almost all on the individual side, while the corporate benefits were more permanent — would be hugely painful for Democrats down the road. (We all remember when Barack Obama helped make the Bush tax cuts permanent, right?) Plus, Democrats have their own big priorities next year that will make it hard to further shrink revenue. Besides the debt limit fight, there’s also the expiration of crucial Obamacare subsidies and the fight to expand the child tax credit. How to prioritize those goals is going to prompt some hard Democratic conversations. We’ll be keeping tabs. — Sarah Ferris GOOD EVENING! Welcome to Inside Congress, the play-by-play guide to all things Capitol Hill, on this Monday, June 24, where we’re anticipating the return of “House jail” twitter with this week’s contempt vote.
| | | | A message from Wells Fargo: Wells Fargo is proud of the role we play for our customers, communities and the U.S. economy. We serve 1 in 3 U.S. households and more than 10% of small businesses in the nation. We serve customers digitally and in-person, with 4,000 locations across the country, operating in 24 of the 30 largest markets. We cover more rural markets than many large banks, and nearly 30% of our branches are in low- or moderate-income census tracts. See how. | | | JOHNSON’S NEXT HEADACHE The House returns Tuesday with a trio of GOP spending bills on deck — and it’ll be much trickier than Speaker Mike Johnson’s relatively drama-free victory on the mammoth defense policy legislation. Republicans aim to pass a trio of packages before the July Fourth recess, including the always-contentious measure to fund the Department of Homeland Security. Freedom Caucus member Rep. Chip Roy (R-Texas) told us he’s encouraging Johnson to use the same playbook to pass spending bills as they did the NDAA — namely, communicate with his hardliners. “We were in and working with the speaker’s office hand in glove,” Roy said. “We tried to minimize some of the more political votes for some of our more moderate members, but we tried to address the issues that needed to be addressed.” What else to watch for: Republicans will unveil more spending bills, including one funding the DOJ that could include Trump’s much-desired language to defund the prosecutors pursuing charges against him, including special counsel Jack Smith, Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg and Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis. — Sarah Ferris
| | | | A message from Wells Fargo:   | | | A BARELY-THERE ADVANTAGE Pennsylvania Rep. Brian Fitzpatrick, one of the House GOP’s toughest-to-beat swing-district members, is up by just two points in new Democratic polling. The new polling is showing a potentially competitive race between Ashley Ehasz, a former Apache helicopter pilot, and Fitzpatrick in the purplish Bucks County. Ehasz, who lost to Fitzpatrick in 2022 by about 10 points, is down 45-47 right now, with 8 percent undecided, according to polling by Upswing Research & Strategy and obtained by Inside Congress. “From conversations our team has had with voters and from this poll data, we know that our district unites around the belief that people’s welfare comes first, and Brian Fitzpatrick’s shameful votes to ban abortion and deny lifesaving healthcare to women are in stark contrast to that belief,” Ehasz campaign manager Rachel Berlowe Binder said in a statement. The group surveyed 400 likely general election voters from June 12-16, with a 4.9 percent margin of error. (As you likely know, polling in House races is pretty hard to come by.) The district that Biden won by 4.7 points in 2020 has been a perennial target for Democrats. In the survey, 18 percent of voters viewed her favorably and 10 percent unfavorably, while 41 percent rated Fitzpatrick favorably and 37 percent unfavorably. Fitzpatrick will be a tough target for House Democrats — he’s massively outraised Ehasz so far, reporting $3.65 million cash on hand at the beginning of April to Ehasz’s roughly $820,000. — Nicholas Wu
| | | | A message from Wells Fargo: Beyond serving our own customers, Wells Fargo’s goal is to be prepared for the unknowns, which means being financially strong, strategically well positioned, and having the operational and management capabilities to not just survive, but to be a source of strength.
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What we say, we do. See how. | | | | | Rep. Josh Gottheimer (D-N.J.) — the co-founder of an incumbent-endorsing Democratic super PAC — today endorsed Rep. Jamaal Bowman’s (D-N.Y.) challenger, George Latimer. QUICK LINKS Matt Gaetz Hits the Road to Reshape the Republican Party. From WSJ’s Natalie Andrews. Democrats in Long Island primary prioritize democracy. Suburban voters may not. From Emily Ngo Corporations face reversal of fortune as 2025 tax debate heats up. From Brian Faler. Exasperated Democrats try to stamp out talk of replacing Biden. From The Hill’s Alex Bolton.
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