GOP Cutting Trump’s Taxes

More than a $1 billion windfall to the Trump family in the Senate tax bill. But the President claims he would lose money.

Asked on Thursday to defend Trump’s claim White House Press Secretary Sarah Sanders said:

“I think some of the provisions in the bill which may or may not be there, we’ll see what the final piece of legislation looks like, but a lot of the deductions that he would probably normally receive may not be part of the, uhh, package that would affect his actual, uhh, what he pays in taxes. But again, until there’s a final piece of legislation I can’t go into much more detail but I know that some versions of it take out a lot of those deductions that currently benefit the President and his family.”

Huh?

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Author: craigcrawford

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48 thoughts on “GOP Cutting Trump’s Taxes”

  1. You might very well say that. I couldn’t possibly comment.

    Francis Urquhart, House of Cards, BBC

     

  2. There! I’ve run rings around you logically!

    Penguin On Top Of The Television Set, Monty Python’s Flying Circus, BBC

  3. while the little people lose deductions, twit sees another one of his increased…ostensibly to garner the vote of 2 recalcitrant senators but doesn’t hurt to pacify the orangehaired bull up-ending the legislative china shop

    excerpt from cnbc:

    A tweaked Senate tax bill would increase the income tax deduction for pass-through businesses to 20 percent from 17.4 percent, Bloomberg and Politico reported, citing unnamed senators. It would not change the headline rate at which those entities’ income is taxed.

    The change appears to be designed to earn support from Sens. Ron Johnson, R-Wis., and Steve Daines, R-Mont. Both senators argued that pass-through businesses would not get as much relief as corporations under the Senate plan.

    Shortly after the reports, Daines tweeted that he will vote Wednesday in favor of starting debate on the bill. He said he saw “some good progress for Main Street businesses in the tax cut bill.”

    Pass-through businesses are not corporations and get taxed at individual rates. While those entities include small businesses, most pass-through income goes to the top 1 percent of American earners, according to research cited by The New York Times.

    billings gazette: “Daines to support Senate tax bill after pass-through businesses get new 20% income tax deduction”         

  4. more on that pass-through thingy that enriches the twit from last night’s pbs newshour “Under this proposed tax cut, big small businesses benefit most”

    The corporate tax rate is not the only important tax cut affecting businesses that’s being considered in the Republican tax bills. The pass-through tax rate affects millions of small businesses, and has been a point of debate and dealing. Hari Sreenivasan talks to Jim Tankersley of The New York Times about that and who really gets the biggest cuts.

    […]

    Jim Tankersley:

    Right. Yes.

    Well, that’s true. There’s still some moving pieces in the legislation. But, right now, if you’re a pass-through owner, you can pay up to 39.6 percent. That’s the top individual income tax rate.

    The Senate bill would cut that rate to 38 percent for all individuals at the very top. And then, beyond that, for everybody, no matter what your rates are up and down the scale, they would give you a 20 percent deduction on the income you earn through your pass-through up to $500,000 for couples, $250,000 for individuals.

    Hari Sreenivasan:

    There’s also a big range of small businesses, so to speak, that aren’t corporations.

    So, is there any idea of how many of these small mom and pop stores actually make enough money that they would benefit from not having to pay 39 percent, but maybe now down to 20 percent?

    Jim Tankersley:

    Well, the rate — it’s a deduction, so it actually helps up and down the income scale. So if you pay the 25 percent rate now, and you get a tax cut here, a rate cut, then you’re also going to get this deduction on top of that. That’s going to help you.

    It’s going to help you if you pay the 12 percent rate. Now, interestingly, it is also going to also help, for example, the Trump Corporation, big companies that are again earning that top rate.

    So, what you have here is a deduction, and what that deduction does is gives everybody up and down the scale some help.

    Hari Sreenivasan:

    So, there have to be some political considerations here of not wanting to look like you’re helping one constituency over another.

    Is it the size, or, I guess, is it the peer group of the Trump corporations? Are they likely to benefit more just because they’re bigger?

    Jim Tankersley:

    Well, sure, yes. They make more money, so they’re going to get more a break.

    And, like I said, this special benefit phases out a bit. You only get to take a half of it after $500,000. But that’s still a lot of money. It’s still a big deduction, and, again with the reduction in rates overall, the businesses that earn the most are going get the bulk of the benefits.

    And we already know that 70 percent of the benefits for pass-throughs in America go to the top 1 percent of American income-earners. So, it is a cut for small businesses. It is also a cut that will predominantly help the rich.

    […continues…]

  5. Remember the good old days when we had Caribou Barbie’s word salads? They were so refreshingly stupid that it was kind of fun. Suckabee’s are different. Hers have a gloss of legitimacy despite the fact that they are nothing but mumbo-jumbo.

  8. hey, a little respect there for the child of maybe the next new senator from Arkansas.  don’t laugh. mike was the gov and did dutifully endorse tom, the cia chief about-to-be.  stranger things have happened.

    akonline: Seat in U.S. Senate in play if Arkansas’ Cotton goes to CIA

  10. or maybe the unfair damsel herself according to the Washington examiner:

    Could we see Senator Sarah Huckabee Sanders?

    [….]

    Political scientists Andrew Dowdle of the University of Arkansas and William McLean of Arkansas State University say it’s possible Sanders would be named, but caution that they don’t view the Huckabee and Hutchinson families as particularly close.

    Sanders’ 2010 role as campaign manager for Arkansas’ other U.S. senator, Republican John Boozman, gives her “someone who could potentially advocate for [her] in that regard,” McLean said. But with low-key Hutchinson, he said, “her current position has probably hurt her more than it’s helped her in terms of getting the appointment.”

    Dowdle, however, could see special circumstances leading to her appointment.

    The Arkansas constitution appears to ban appointed senators from seeking re-election, Dowdle said, meaning “we can’t have a Luther Strange situation,” where someone intends to hold on to the office.

    “That might end up increasing the chance Sanders is appointed because it ends up striking down so many people,” he said.

    Dowdle said “it can’t be fun to be press secretary at this point” and that being an appointed senator would “open the doors for other federal appointments” for Sanders or even cue up a campaign for governor in 2022, when term-limited Hutchison cannot run.

  12. Will the republicans get through the tax cut for the one percent?  Or will it fall off the side while the republicans go and try to make a budget before next Friday, December 8?  Or will they do the agreed continuing resolution and shut down the government on December 22?

    Something different for this showdown, as compared to the last few years, is the federal government agencies are starting the background preparations in just in case it happens.

  14. 62 years ago on this date, Rosa Parks was arrested and jailed for refusing to give up her seat on a bus to a white man, sparking the Montgomery Bus Boycott.

  15. Back on the population hobby horse.  There is no way this tax plan can create jobs due to one simple very old law:  Supply and demand.

    There are way too many human beings around the globe and way too few low to mid level jobs for them to fill.  There is no retraining money in the bill even if a large percentage of these excess human beings are capable of being trained to high level jobs.  There is no money for infrastructure or public service jobs which would pay people in the low to mid range to make things safe or beautiful but have no particular profit production.

    Ergo:  This whole tax package is not just a lie, but it is destructive and likely to produce a major crash.

  20. GOPers made 4 big promises on tax effort:
    – won’t increase the debt
    – designed for middle class
    – wealthy & Trump won’t benefit
    – will supercharge economy

    Broke all four promises

     

  21. Footsteps in the East Wing.  The circle of denial is shrinking.  This should be a fun day for WH watchers.  Will the republicans pass the tax cut for the one percenters today? Maybe.  But that is too late to take the enjoyment out of watching this guy go down, and the wonderful pleasure of knowing SFB is trying to remember what he talked about with Flynn, Russia and money laundering.

  24. Cornyn says the goops have the votes to pass the tax bill.  Get those ads ready for next November – 3 bucks to you, a Billion bucks to trump brought to you by the republican congress.  Vote them out.

  25. wait wait there’s more

    oil and gas drilling now allowed  in the artic wilderness as part of the tax bill

  26. If you aren’t a corporate CEO and/or multi-millionaire, there is something for everyone else to hate in the tax bill.

  27. Hoping that Mueller drops the hammer on a few of the Congressional people who are Russian supporters/agents and also dragging the hearings into the quagmire.  What do we have left on the list? Sessions. Pence. Kushner. SFB jr. And especially SFB.

  29. thanks for the link, craig.  found these morsels in it very tasty, salivating in anticipation:

    Flynn admitted in his plea that senior transition officials directed his contacts with Russian officials in late December of last year.

    and

    ABC News reported that Flynn is prepared to offer “full cooperation” to Mueller’s team and testify against President Trump and other Trump family members. The biggest bombshell in the report: Flynn will state that then-candidate Trump directed him to get in contact with Russian officials.

    Flynn’s plea deal confirmed aspects of the ABC report as the statement of facts filed in federal court placed Flynn in contact with multiple senior members of the Trump transition team, huddled at Mar-a-Lago on December 29, 2016, who directed his contacts with Russian officials, per the AP.

  31. this is not exactly what they had in mind, but it is Friday and it is bad news.

    from politicaldictionary: Friday news dump

    Releasing bad news or documents on a Friday afternoon in an attempt to avoid media scrutiny.

    NPR: “Often, the White House sets the release of bad news and unflattering documents to late Friday afternoon. The Pentagon and other agencies also use the practice, a legacy of earlier administrations.”

    The television show The West Wing had an episode on the technique called, “Take out the trash day.”

    Donna: What’s take out the trash day?
    Josh: Friday.
    Donna: I mean, what is it?
    Josh: Any stories we have to give the press that we’re not wild about, we give all in a lump on Friday.
    Donna: Why do you do it in a lump?
    Josh: Instead of one at a time?
    Donna: I’d think you’d want to spread them out.
    Josh: They’ve got X column inches to fill, right? They’re going to fill them no matter what.
    Donna: Yes.
    Josh: So if we give them one story, that story’s X column inches.
    Donna: And if we give them five stories …
    Josh: They’re a fifth the size.
    Donna: Why do you do it on Friday?
    Josh: Because no one reads the paper on Saturday.
    Donna: You guys are real populists, aren’t you?

  33. Oh, and I saw a 5 second clip of the lighting of the WH Christmas tree.  Is it an aluminum tree left over from the 60s?  It is simply awful.

  34. from heavy:

    Once the news about Flynn’s guilty plea broke, online betting markets lowered the odds they offer on Trump’s chances of making it to the end of his four-year presidential term.

    PredictIt.com is an online betting market which specifically asks the question “Will Donald Trump be impeached in his first term?” On Friday morning, before Flynn’s guilty plea, PredictIt gave the odds of Trump’s impeachment at 33 percent. After Flynn’s guilty plea, that went up to 41 percent (as of noon, Eastern Standard Time).

    Specifically, on Friday morning it cost 33 cents to place a bet that Trump would eventually be impeached, later raised to 41 cents. (If PredictIt charges 41 cents to place a given bet, that means there’s a 41 percent chance of it happening.)

    […]

    Of course, if Trump does involuntarily leave office before the official end of his term, “impeachment” is not the only possible exit vehicle. In October 2017, Vanity Fair reported that Trump’s former chief strategist Steve Bannon told Trump the main threat to his presidency was not impeachment but the 25th amendment, which allows for the removal of a president who is “unable to discharge the duties and powers of his office.” (Supposedly, when Bannon warned Trump about the 25th amendment, Trump responded by asking “What’s that?” Vanity Fair also reported that Bannon himself told people he thought Trump’s odds of making it to the end of his term were only 30 percent.)

    Flynn’s legal troubles are not the only possible road to impeachment. On Nov. 30, the day before Flynn’s guilty plea, Congressman Al Green gave a speech saying he would try forcing an impeachment vote in the House of Representatives the following week. “I refuse to stand idly by as a billionaire bigot does irreparable harm to my country,” Green said. “A billionaire bigot who tolerates the KKK, but won’t tolerate Islam. A billionaire bigot who tolerates anti-Semitism, racism, sexism, ethnocentrism, xenophobia and homophobia.”

  37. Shame Allen Drury isn’t still alive.

    Flynn charged.  Implicates Pence.  Pence resigns or gets impeached.  Trump appoints Ryan.  Trump resigns.  Ryan becomes POTUS.  House switches to Dems in 2018.  Nancy become Speaker.  Congress abolishes gerrymandering.  Ryan ousted in 2020.  Permanent Dem majorities for next two decades.

     

  39. Jamie & pogo, my crystal ball also sees a ryan potus deal achieving that by exchanging slam dunk impeachments and post ouster criminal charges (income tax evasion/lying about) for resignations and pardons.

    always thought the only reason the gopers didn’t try to do in obama and biden was the threat of speaker nancy or sos hillary being too close in the line of succession to risk it

  40. usnews: Comey and Bharara Weigh In on Flynn
    The former FBI director and the former federal prosecutor offered comments about justice and hints about what to watch out for.
    Hell hath no fury like a Justice Department official fired by President Donald Trump – or a journalist whose publication he’s bashed as “failing.”

    As news of former White House national security adviser Michael Flynn’s plea deal in the Russia investigation swept across the Internet, former FBI director James Comey – whom Trump fired after, among other things, asking if he would go easy on Flynn in a then-ongoing investigation – served up an ice-cold slice of revenge on Twitter, the president’s favorite medium.

    “But justice roll down like waters and righteousness like an ever-flowing stream” Amos 5:24,” he tweeted. For good measure, or perhaps maximum schadenfreude, Comey cross-posted the Bible quote on Instagram, adding a photo of a brook with rushing water.

    Wednesday evening, Comey tweeted another quote that drew nearly as much attention in light of Flynn’s guilty plea: “”The truth is incontrovertible. Malice may attack it, ignorance may deride it, but in the end, there it is.” – Winston Churchill”

    [….]

    He wasn’t the only former fired Justice official to troll the president on Twitter: Preet Bharara, a former federal prosecutor whom Trump fired not long after taking office, took a shot, urging people to watch Trump’s Twitter feed for reaction to news that Flynn will say he took orders on Russia from the president himself.

    “Now watch carefully again what Trump says, does, tweets in light of this news,” Bharara wrote.

    Possibly urging his followers to do a little homework for upcoming events, Bharara also tweeted a link to a New York Times primer on the Logan Act, the 17th-century law that prohibits Americans from interacting with foreign governments and interfering in U.S. foreign policy.

    […continues…]

  41. I recall a video from several months ago in which Ms Pelosi and Mr Grassley emerged from a closed door committee meeting. I don’t recall whether it was Intelligence or Judiciary, but they both looked very shaken. I recall that the consensus in the commentary was that they had heard testimony and seen evidence showing the depths of the election conspiracy that rocked them to the core.

    I still wonder if that’s true, and if it is, has Mr Mueller uncovered those depths.

  42. Now it turns out that the “senior” person is Kushner.  May have to edit novel since Kushner means Ivanka which means POTUS and enough family dynamics to fill a Shakespeare history cycle.

     

  43. Mr. Kushner, Mr. Mueller is on the line.  He’d like to speak with you in his office if you have a few minutes.

  44. Jamie – the trail leads right up the horse’s patooie.  How many of the senators are thinking this is their last act before being voted out and might as well vote to kill America?

    I like the idea that SFB has that this wraps up by the end of the year.  It will not, of course, but we will have many more presents for the holiday to enjoy.  The reason for a fast ending is like watching fireworks and the finale is lots of stuff blowing up.   Maybe Mueller will do that and for the last blast have an orange shot go high up and burns up fast, smashing into the ground and disappears in the mud.

    The Senate seems to be going for a long, a very long, night.  The bill which was promised five hours ago has yet to arrive.  Seems the lobbyists are still looking at what else to destroy. CSPAN 2 has live coverage.

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