No Deadline
Initial market euphoria that Trump’s election would lead to a once-in-a-generation opportunity to completely rewrite the tax code has begun to give way to more sober assessments, especially following GOP divisions that thwarted the Obamacare repeal effort. Kevin Brady, head of the tax-writing House Ways and Means Committee, said in November that Congress would be ready to act on tax legislation in the first 100 days of the new administration.
Now, Brady is saying that while his committee still intends to introduce legislation in the spring, there isn’t a specific deadline for action.
“Tax reform is incredibly difficult. It is not easy,” Brady told reporters earlier this week. “It is for lawmakers and Congress and the White House, the challenge of a lifetime.”
‘Celebrity Apprentice’
“I think what they’re going to do is play ‘Celebrity Apprentice,’ tax-reform style,” said Harold Hancock, who served as tax counsel for six years on the Ways and Means Committee before joining law firm McGuireWoods LLP last month. “They’ll see what the House does, see what the Senate does,” then make a decision about what to do, he said.
Spicer has tried to manage tax timing expectations during recent press conferences. “We’re at the first stages of the process” and “beginning to engage with Congress,” he said on March 30, adding that the timeline could be “several months.”
One thing complicating the administration’s tax overhaul efforts is that it’s unclear who’s taking the lead.
“I don’t think there’s clarity yet on who’s running the train,” said Stephen Shay, a senior lecturer at Harvard Law School, who was a senior tax official at Treasury during the last big tax overhaul under President Ronald Reagan. Referring to the current administration, Shay said “there’s nobody inside who has the knowledge base to put together tax reform.”
House Conservatives