The House tax-writing committee entered its third day of work Wednesday to hammer out the details of the Republican tax cut plan. Here are the latest developments, updated throughout the day:
Obamacare Mandate Repeal Gains Traction, Again (11 a.m.)
The impact of House Ways and Means Chairman Kevin Brady’s amendment to revise one of the GOP tax bill’s offshore provisions emerged late Tuesday -- an estimated $74 billion revenue hole, which is sending tax writers scrambling to find additional revenue.
They may pursue a risky strategy to make up the shortfall: repealing the 2010 Affordable Care Act’s individual mandate. House Republicans are edging closer to accepting President Donald Trump’s suggestion to combine their tax legislation with a repeal of the mandate that all individuals purchase health insurance or pay a penalty, according to a person who’s helping to draft the tax bill.
Rolling back Obamacare’s insurance requirement would save the U.S. $338 billion over 10 years, according to a revised estimate Wednesday from the Congressional Budget Office, a smaller benefit than previously projected. The move risks alienating GOP senators, who voted down a measure that would have repealed the so-called individual mandate last summer.
While ending the mandate could free funds up for a tax overhaul, it would also leave more people without health insurance: CBO estimated in December that 15 million more people would be uninsured if the mandate was ended, and premiums would increase 20 percent. The agency is expected to provide an updated coverage estimate Wednesday.
Consideration of the individual-mandate repeal began to gain traction late Tuesday as Republican members of the House Ways and Means Committee came under pressure from GOP colleagues to preserve popular tax credits and deductions, said the person, who asked not to be identified because of the sensitivity of the matter.
It may gain even more traction after a report showed that changing one of the international provisions -- effectively gutting a controversial proposal to tax U.S. companies’ payments to related foreign affiliates -- along with some other last-minute changes from Monday evening would increase the 10-year deficit that the tax bill would produce by $160.7 billion, to $1.57 trillion, according to the Joint Committee on Taxation. The tax legislation must stay under the $1.5 trillion limit set in Congress’s 2018 budget resolution to avoid the threat of a Democratic filibuster in the Senate that could kill it.
Still, House Freedom Caucus Chairman Mark Meadows doubted that the repeal of the Obamacare mandate would be included in the House bill.
“There is a concern about having the health-care debate and tax reform happen simultaneously,” Meadows said earlier Tuesday. “House leadership hasn’t specifically said that but the indication, if I’m reading between the lines, is there’s no way it gets in the House version.”