White House Amenable to Bipartisan Tax Reform
White House officials, unwilling to repeat the Obamacare repeal failure and keenly aware of intraparty dissidence, have been discussing tax reform with House Democrats. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin and chief economic advisor Gary Cohn have been meeting with members of the House’s Blue Dog Coalition and the bipartisan Problem Solvers Caucus to drum up support for reform. While the White House endorses a cross-party approach to tax reform, director of legislative affairs Marc Short said the decision on how to proceed ultimately lies with Congressional Republicans, a nod to Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell’s statement that the GOP would utilize the reconciliation process to pass a tax reform bill. While reconciliation voting is not constrained by party affiliation, Dem. Virginia Sen. Mark Warner predicted that if the Republicans opted to use the fast-track procedure, no Democrat would support the bill.