Dems voice support for GOP payroll tax cut plan
The two top Democrats in the House and Senate today announced that they back House Republican leadership's idea of passing the payroll tax extension without offsets, allowing the deficit to increase by $100 billion.
House Minority leader Nancy Pelosi said in a statement that "we have long proposed bringing this tax cut to the floor without payfors and House Democrats will support it so that taxes are not raised on 160 million working Americans. But this should not be a substitute for the work of the Conference Committee."
Senate Majority leader Harry Reid predicted Tuesday that "the payroll tax is going to pass," but stopped short of saying the Senate will accept whatever the House passes.
"We're waiting to see what we get from the House, and then we'll decide what we have to do in the foreseeable future after that," Reid said.
Both Pelosi and Reid raised concerns about unemployment insurance and the so-called "Doc Fix," which would prevent doctors who treat Medicare patients from seeing a pay cut. Both of those items, which have been part of the payroll tax package this year, also expire at the end of this month and Reid and Pelosi are calling for Congress to cancel the President's Day recess next week if they are not passed.
It remains to be seen whether the stand-alone payroll tax bill will even come to the House floor since it's not clear yet whether House Republicans will back the plan. Speaker John Boehner and Majority Leader Eric Cantor are set to meet with the GOP conference tonight to discuss and explain the idea of backing down on offsetting the tax cut, a major reversal after House Republicans for months insisted the payroll tax extension not add to the deficit.
The question is whether GOP members will see House leadership's logic, that getting beyond the payroll tax fight is the political best move, or whether they will see it as sacrificing their principles.
Not offsetting the tax cut, which gives working Americans a 2 percent tax cut in their paychecks, gives Republicans what Minority Whip Steny Hoyer called "philosophical consistency" on the issue of paying for tax breaks. Democrats have accused Republicans of hypocrisy given their insistence on paying for middle class tax cuts while maintaining that is unnecessary for tax breaks that benefit the wealthiest Americans.
Boehner and GOP leaders, however, have had difficulty in the past getting the conference, many of whom were elected with a mandate to slash the deficit, to go down the politically strategic path.
If GOP leaders are able to get enough Republican support for the move, the House could take up the payroll tax extension as early as tomorrow.
