President Trump will be putting intense pressure on Senate Democrats in states that he won in November, demanding that they get on board for tax reform, according to sources involved in the White House plan to tap into widespread support for tax relief in Trump country.
It’s part of a more aggressive White House offensive to break up solid opposition from Senate Democrats than mounted during the failed effort to repeal Obamacare, when Republicans couldn’t get a single defection from the other side of the aisle in the narrowly divided chamber.
This time though, Mr. Trump has advantages: tax reform is less ingrained in Democratic Party dogma than Obamacare and in the states that matter, tax cuts have popular support.
A new survey found support for tax reform topping 60 percent in 10 states where Mr. Trump defeated Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton and where Senate Democrats are up for re-election.
The highest support — more than 70 percent — was in four states that Mr. Trump won by double-digits and where incumbent Democrat Senators are particularly vulnerable: West Virginia, Montana, North Dakota and Missouri, according to the poll by GOP-allied Definers Public Affairs and WPA Intelligence.
“Our voter modeling also provides a stark warning to these incumbent Senate Democrats about the potential political peril of joining an effort to obstruct tax reform: Nearly twice as many voters already support the tax reform effort today than supported these Democrats when they were last elected in 2012,” said the pollsters.
Details of the reforms are still being hammered out with Republican leaders in Congress, but the goals are the same ones Mr. Trump campaigned on.
He wants to simplify the tax code, reduce rates for businesses and individuals, and eliminate most deductions. Several popular deductions, including mortgage interest and charitable donations, would remain in place.
Democratic leaders are telling voters that Mr. Trump is trying to trick them with promises of less taxes and more jobs, when he’s really giving tax breaks to the wealthy and taking away benefits for everyone else.
“Every version of the tax plan that Donald Trump and Republicans in Congress have put forward would overwhelmingly benefit the superrich and corporations over hardworking Americans,” said Democratic National Committee Chairman Tom Perez.
“It should come as no surprise that Trump’s tax push is being led by two Wall Street executives. This is the same rigging of our economy that Republicans have tried for decades: slash health care, Social Security, education, infrastructure and vital programs for working families,” he said. “Under this plan, the richest Americans would become even richer at the expense of middle-class families.”
Mr. Trump provide a taste of the blunt case he’s making to Democrats when he singled out Sen. Claire McCaskill while stumping for the tax plan last week in her home state Missouri.
“We must lower our taxes and your senator, Claire McCaskill, she must do this for you, and if she doesn’t, you have to vote her out of office,” the president said to cheers from his supporters at a Springfield factory.
Sensitive to voters’ desire for tax relief, Ms. McCaskill has said she is ready to work with Mr. Trump on a tax code overhaul.
Tax reform has been a bipartisan issue in the past.
In 2001, President George W. Bush’s tax cuts passed the Senate with eight Democrats joining all 50 of the chamber’s Republicans. Democrats voting yes included one current member Sen. Dianne Feinstein of California, although she’s not expected to break with her party’s resistance to the president this time.
Expect Mr. Trump to call out more Democrats by name in states he carried by large margins, including Sens. Joe Manchin of West Virginia, Jon Tester of Montana and Heidi Heitkamp of North Dakota.
Tax reform garnered 77 percent support in West Virginia, 75 percent in Montana, 72 percent in North Dakota and Missouri, according to the Definers Public Affairs/WPA Intelligence poll.
In many of the states, nearly twice as many voters already support the tax reform effort today than supported the same Democratic senators when they last ran in 2012, according to the data.
The Republican National Committee also is launching a nationwide campaign to push Democrat lawmakers on tax reform. It will include a digital campaign and surrogates fanned out across the country for hits on TV, radio and in print.
The RNC already has over 150 staff in 16 states ahead of the 2018 election to engage voters on the tax reform issue.
“Tax relief for American families should be a bipartisan issue that even Democrats can get behind,” said RNC spokesman Ryan Mahoney. “If Democrats stand in the way of job creation, increasing paychecks, and simplifying the burdensome tax process, they’ll have to answer to angry voters next election.”
• S.A. Miller can be reached at smiller@washingtontimes.com.
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