Michael Linden
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Michael Linden
@michaelslinden.bsky.social
6.4K followers 120 following 190 posts
Just thinks we should stop spending trillions on tax breaks for the rich.

Campaign Director at Families Over Billionaires. Senior Policy Fellow at Washington Center for Equitable Growth.

Formerly: OMB, Senate Budget, Senate HELP, Groundwork, CAP.
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Reposted by Michael Linden
ddayen.bsky.social
The bill is the GOP’s top priority, and its goals to cut taxes and kick the poor are broadly shared by Republicans. But the scramble to both scale back House cuts *and* add more Senate cuts seems like a heavy lift.
prospect.org/politics/202...
The looming problem for this deficit hawk debate also involves the parliamentarian. The current CBO estimate, just updated on Thursday, says that the bill adds $3 trillion in debt when you include interest costs. But under the “current policy baseline” magic math favored by Senate Republicans, which wipes away the $3.7 trillion cost of extending the 2017 tax cuts, the bill actually saves money. However, this is contingent on the parliamentarian’s approval as well. Democrats are going to challenge the current policy baseline magic math, and though some Republicans want the parliamentarian to be ignored, Thune—for now—has said he wouldn’t do that. If their “current policy baseline” goes away, Republicans will no longer have that fig leaf to say that the bill saves money, and would have a weaker argument to counter the deficit hawks. Suddenly, trillions would have to be found, either by scaling back the tax cuts or adding more spending trims, to reach something closer to deficit neutrality. That’s probably why some Republicans are poking around Medicare, a Trump red line, for cuts. The recipe is for more fights, and more red lines. Again, the expectation is still that something gets done. But stay tuned.
June 6, 2025 at 1:48 PM
Reposted by Michael Linden
keepyourselfalive.bsky.social
April 5, 2025 at 2:57 PM