Exclusive: The chairman of the largest House GOP Caucus is using tax days to send warnings about financial stocks that American families may face next year if Republicans fail to plan a massive, conservative policy overhaul.
Republican Research Committee (RSC) Chairman August Pfluger, R-Texas, told Fox News Digital that if Congress does not pass the budget settlement bill extending President Donald Trump’s 2017 Tax Cuts and Employment Act (TCJA), millions of Americans can see taxes increase by a fifth.
“If Democrats give way and expire these tax cuts, Americans will be crushed by the biggest tax cuts in history. A 22% increase will reach 40 million families and 26 million small businesses,” Pfluger said.
“It’s time to lock these historic tax cuts in forever, promote job creation, fuel the American economic engine and protect family budgets from the left tax and spending agenda.”
Meet Trump Pick’s lawmakers speaking at the Full House GOP conference to Johnson
President Donald Trump arrives on January 25, 2025 to talk about his policy to end taxes on tips in Las Vegas (Mandel NGAN/AFP via Getty Images)
The RSC serves as a virtually conservative think tank for House GOP, with over 175 members. Pfluger reiterated that the group “fights to make Trump’s historic tax cuts and employment permanent, so families can maintain their hard-earned money instead of sending it to the IRS.”
Rep. Beth Van Duyne of R-Texas, chairman of the RSC Budget Task Force, said expanding the TCJA and enacting Trump’s other tax policy initiatives will help the United States become “the most lucrative country to invest, transfer or expand business” and help support families and businesses.
“These important, growth-promoting tax reforms work with efforts to reduce federal regulations and bureaucracy to enhance the economic expansion and economic security of Americans and our work creators,” she said.
Tax reform is the basis of Republican efforts on settlements and a mechanism that allows parties controlling the key levers of government to enact financial and budgetary cleaning. This is done by lowering the Senate threshold from 60 to 51 votes, subject to issues relating to taxes, expenditures and government bonds.
Senate GOP pushes Trump’s budget framework after marathon voting series
August Pfluger, chairman of the Republican Research Committee, is pushing for an extension of Trump’s tax cuts. (Getty Images)
In addition to extending the TCJA tax cut, Trump also hopes Republicans will eliminate taxes on tipping and overtime wages as well as social security benefits for retirees.
House Republicans passed the framework last week and came in sync with the Senate on the Budget Settlement Bill. This allows the relevant Parliamentary Committee to begin work filling out its framework in policy.
But Congressional Republicans have a long way to go to pass the bill in both the House and Senate. The House version calls for at least $1.5 trillion in spending cuts, but the Senate baseline is $4 billion, but Republicans have vowed to try even more.
Extending the TCJA alone would reduce federal revenue by $4.5 trillion, according to the Tax Foundation, and House conservatives are leading the responsibility to demand sudden government funding cuts to offset that.
The RSC Steering Group, the group’s leadership division, announced its official status earlier this year.
But at the same time, failing to extend Trump’s tax cuts ahead of the 2026 midterm elections could have politically devastating results, but it robbed fears of a slump if it deteriorated by Trump’s drastic additional tariff costs.
“If the tax cuts expire, families will lose about $1,000,” Kimberly, a senior non-resident fellow at the Peterson Institute for International Economics, told Fox News Digital earlier this month, citing a model for the Urban Blue Kings Tax Policy Center.
And if the recently announced tariffs continue unabated at that point, “it would generate a $3,800 loss for the average consumer per household,” she added, pointing to Yale Budget Lab estimates. Since then, Trump has returned much of his mutual tariff policies.
Click here to get the Fox News app
The House Ways and Means Committee, the House Tax Writing Committee, issued a similar warning to Pfluger about potential tax increases if the TCJA is not extended, and released a memo late last year.
“Congress has had to act quickly to threaten this tax hike from the table, and gave the American people the bailout they had been demanding had arrived,” the December memo said.
Elizabeth Elkind is the main reporter of Fox News Digital’s reporting in the House of Representatives. Previous digital bylines seen on Daily Mail and CBS News.
Follow me on Twitter at @liz_elkind and send tips to Elizabeth.elkind@fox.com
Source link
