Democrats Fear Senate Finance Republicans Poised To Sink Bipartisan Tax Bill

Democrat aides are concerned that Republicans on the Senate Finance Committee are slow-walking the House-passed bipartisan and bicameral USD$78 billion tax bill in order to "kill it" ahead of the general election, according to Semafor.

• The tax bill, negotiated over 19 months by Senator Ron Wyden (R-OR) and Representative Jason Smith (D-MO) to enhance child tax credit and reinstate some business tax breaks, sailed through the House in an overwhelming bipartisan vote in January but has since stalled in the Senate Finance Committee amid calls by ranking Republican Mike Crapo (R-ID) for a markup of the bill.
• Most analysts believe a markup could open a "can of worms" for the bill with partisan amendments from both parties likely to undermine support for the bill in the House.
• Sen Thom Tilis (R-NC) wrote in a WSJ op-edthis week panning the bill: "If the Wyden-Smith bill becomes law, all Republican leverage will be lost, even in a second Trump term. Left-wing Democrats will demand the next step: a fully refundable child tax credit for nonworking filers to realize the dream of turning this tax relief into a full-fledged welfare program."
• Doug Sword at Tax Notes told Forbes: "Senate Finance Republicans hope to control the committee in 2025 after the elections... Control of the committee would give Senate Republicans a much stronger hand in those negotiations, and some wouldn't mind if the current bipartisan bill went away for a little while... As one Republican negotiator put it to me, everything is about 2025."