The Senate’s newly adopted budget blueprint has triggered a fight over the merits of wiping away the cost of tax-cut extensions in a bid to make them permanent — a dispute that could bog down work on a GOP reconciliation package in coming months.
Democrats have attacked Republicans’ decision to use a “current policy” baseline to assume that extending the 2017 tax cuts expiring after this year has no cost since they are just preserving the status quo. Pennsylvania Rep. Brendan F. Boyle, the top Democrat on the House Budget Committee, bluntly labeled that line of reasoning as “bullshit” in a written statement.
House Republicans have voiced similar concerns in softer terms. The absence of deeper spending cuts in the Senate’s reconciliation instructions is a factor, although senators say they aim to achieve close to, if not more than, the House’s $2 trillion-cuts target.
