Rep. Mike Lawler
As the Republican-controlled U.S. Senate mulls changes to President Donald Trump's "One Big Beautiful Bill Act," one House Republican is warning his Senate counterparts against tweaking one particular section.
During a Sunday interview with CNN congressional correspondent Manu Raju, Rep. Mike Lawler (R-NY) cautioned Senate Republicans against making any changes to the state and local tax (SALT) deduction he and others negotiated with House Republican leadership. The SALT deduction cap is currently at $10,000, but House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA.) agreed to raise the cap to $40,000 in order to convince House's SALT caucus to support the legislation.
"This is an issue that not just impacts blue states, it impacts nearly every state in the country," Lawler said. "29 states blew through the $10,000 cap over the last seven years. And so lifting the cap on SALT is critically important. It provides middle-class tax relief. And that's exactly what we did here."
"I've been very clear with leadership all this past week that if the Senate changes the SALT deduction in any way, I will be a no," he continued. "And I'm not going to buckle on that. And I've spoken to my other colleagues, they will be a no as well."
Lawler's remarks come as Senate Republicans have spoken openly about slashing the SALT deduction, which they say is overwhelmingly beneficial to Americans in blue states (which typically have higher state and local tax rates). Sen. Mike Crapo (R-Idaho), who chairs the Senate Finance Committee, said last week that senators are likely to nix the SALT deal in the package they intend to send back to the House of Representatives.
"There’s not a single [Republican] senator from New York or New Jersey or California, and so there’s not a strong mood in the Senate Republican caucus right now to do $353 billion for states that basically the other states subsidize," Crapo said on Wednesday.
The House only narrowly passed the massive 1,037-page budget bill by a 215-214 margin in May, and only did so with the help of the SALT caucus, which includes representatives like Andrew Garbarino (R-NY), Young Kim (R-CA) and Nick LaLota (R-NY, as well as Lawler. Should they withhold their support from a final bill that cuts the SALT deduction, the legislation would likely fail to pass.
Reprinted with permission from Alternet.
