Trump's swimmer of a tax increase for the rich quickly comes into the GOP resistance

President Donald Trump's last-minute urge to raise taxes on the richest Americans meets opposition in the Republican Party, in which such suggestions have long been an anthema.

While the Republicans of the Congress put together a massive tax and spending package that Trump has transmitted domestic politics agenda, the White House has the idea of ​​giving the tax rate to top earners in order to increase in order to pay other priorities for taxes, immigration and military without shortening programs such as Medicaid that have millions of Americans on relry.

However, the proposal was given a rapid setback by the Republicans behind the scenes this week and doubts whether he will be released in the party's package, although a draft has not yet been completed.

Trump, who has sent mixed signals in this matter in recent weeks, has the idea of ​​increasing the top rate for those who earn at least $ 2.5 million a year from $ 37% to 39.6% during a phone with the House spokesman, Mike Johnson, R-La, as NBC News previously reported.

In a social post of truth on Friday, Trump said that he “a” tiny “tax increase for the rich” friendly accept “and at the same time warn of potential attacks by Democrats. He said that the Republicans should” probably not “, but that he was” ok “if they were doing it.

And later on Friday Trump said that he thought it was “a good policy” to raise taxes on the rich “to support people with less income”.

“But I don't think they'll do it,” he said.

Grover Norquist, the President of the American for the tax reform, told NBC News that Trump called him on Wednesday to seek his contribution to a tax increase for top earners. Norquist said he had pushed the proposal back hard and called both economic and political reasons.

“I gave him my feeling why I thought that a discussion about increasing interest rates was a bad idea: Because it would kill jobs, it is harmful to small companies, nobody in the campaign has ever discussed this as an option,” said Norquist. “The other part is that the entire Republican party is against it.”

Norquist said Trump had heard about his reasoning, and the president even aroused the example of how President George HW Bush politically suffered politically because of his notorious campaign promises from 1988: “Read my lips: no new taxes”. Trump also referred to Bush's truth in his social post on Friday.

The idea of ​​a tax rate increase was not well received by the Republicans on the Capitol Hill, even though they maintained the idea after Trump's call with Johnson on Wednesday. The GOP leadership of House and Senate, which has long been resistant to the increase in the top tax rate, will be communicated on Thursday evening that the legislator and helper is not given that according to four GOP sources that are not enough for a tax increase over the rich.

Johnson and Trump spoke again by phone on Thursday, said Norquist and a GOP source familiar with the call.

The majority leader of the Senate, John Thune, Rs.d., said on Friday that Republicans are “all about reducing taxes”.

“I don't want taxes to rise on someone … but the president, he is not a conventional president. People are not voted for a conventional president, and I think his policy reflects that,” said Thune about Cnbcs “Squawk Box”. “It all starts in the House of Representatives, you have to find out how you can choose.”

The Republicans also have some confusion about how serious Trump is with a plan to raise taxes on the rich. Two weeks ago, Trump had publicly shot down the idea of ​​a tax increase of the millionaires.

Members of the Trump administration also sent contradictory signals on Friday. The Press spokesman for the White House, Karoline Leavitt, said on a Friday that Trump would personally do nothing to pay more money to “help the poor and the middle class and the working class”, but “These negotiations are not yet complete on the Capitol Hill.”

In the meantime, Kevin Hassett, director of the National Economic Council, said on Friday on CNBC that Trump said “not enthusiastic” about a tax increase for the rich “that” it is not at the top of the president's list. “

The White House did not answer further comments on an inquiry. Johnson's office did not answer a request for comment.

The topic has developed as an important flashpoint for the GOP, both in terms of the fate of its “large, beautiful bill” and in the direction of the broader party, which has exceeded more working class under Trump. This made some Republicans, like the former advisor to the White House Steve Bannon, to argue that a tax increase on the rich, while a significant break from the traditional party orthodoxy, corresponds to Trump's populist approach.

Senator Josh Hawley, R-Mo.

“Maybe one or two, but I don't think,” said Hawley, who tried to position himself as an advocate of the working class.

Ryan Ellis, a long -standing tax policy advisor of the conservatives, said that the appetite for higher taxes on the rich was not there among Republicans and predicted that they would “resist Trump” if he tried to pursue it.

“This is a republican mortal sin. It would be like asking a [Democrat] To deny that climate change exists or something, ”said Ellis.

The Republicans of the House race at the Memorial Day, which means that they no longer have time to make important decisions.

Trump's developing position to the tax share of the law is only one of the problems that GOP leaders plague on the hill. Johnson is also caught in a power struggle between moderate and conservatives at Medicaid, while she is fighting with a small group of Republicans from Blue States who were able to torpedo the entire efforts for the state and local tax deduction.

The house and medium-sized committee, which extends the tax reductions of Trump in 2017, aims to mark their part of the legislation next week.

MP Jason Smith, R-Mo., The chairman of the committee, should meet Trump in the White House on Friday afternoon, according to a GOP source familiar with the matter.