Donald Trump has promised to implement policies that will benefit voters’ wallets if he’s elected in November, but he’s offered few details about how he plans to pay for them. It’s a series of campaign promises that run counter to the Republican Party’s longstanding orthodoxy of fiscal discipline and small government.
Last week, Trump announced that the government would pay for fertility treatments like in vitro fertilization, which can cost tens of thousands of dollars per cycle, if he runs again. He has also proposed eliminating taxes on employee tips and Social Security benefits, which nonpartisan scorekeepers say would add hundreds of billions of dollars to the deficit. His campaign has not said how he plans to pay for these ideas.
Combined with his plans to extend key parts of his 2017 tax cut law and cut corporate taxes even further, Trump’s policy plan would add nearly $6 trillion to the deficit over 10 years, according to a Penn Wharton budget model. analysis.
Trump’s plans amount to handing out what is now Utah Senator Mitt Romney, who lost to former President Barack Obama in the 2012 presidential race, once criticized as “gifts.” Trump’s rhetoric shows how he has transformed the party from one that at least touted fiscal responsibility — even as the national debt skyrocketed during the last two GOP administrations — to one in which the presidential candidate is free to do whatever it takes to win.
Trump making big campaign promises is nothing new. During his 2016 campaign, he promised to build hundreds of miles of wall on the southern border of the US if elected, and make Mexico pay for it. Mexico did not pay; the US government footed the bill for the portions of the border barrier he was able to build. Trump also promised to repeal the Affordable Care Act and replace it with a “much better” health care program. That never happened either.
What’s notable about Trump’s second run for the White House, however, is his focus on appealing to two critical Democratic voting blocs: women skeptical of his abortion rights stance and working-class black and Hispanic voters. Vice President Kamala Harris, for example, quickly backed eliminating tip taxes last month shortly after Trump did, a recognition of the idea’s popularity among union members in Nevada and other states.
“Trump doesn’t have a solid foundation in policy development that he’s developed over many years of working with conservative leaders,” GOP strategist Kevin Madden, who served as an adviser to Romney’s 2012 presidential campaign, told HuffPost on Wednesday. “He’s transactional and approaches his audience the same way any real estate professional or salesperson would.”
“Both Harris and Trump are under enormous pressure to compete for the remaining swing voters,” he added. “Their strategies are not all that different in that they are tackling the most important issues, like inflation, housing and health care, by making big promises that poll well, even though the costs and prospects of turning those promises into actual legislation may be out of reach.”
Harris, meanwhile, has proposed more generous tax credits for children and earned income to support families, and payments to Americans to make housing more affordable, insisting that the return on investment these policies would have on the economy would functionally make them pay for themselves. But since she supports rolling back some of Trump’s 2017 tax cuts and raising the corporate tax rate, her agenda is estimated to cost significantly less than her GOP rival’s: about $1.7 trillion over 10 years.
Whoever wins in November will have to turn vague campaign promises into reality by working with Congress to craft legislation. Lawmakers must decide whether and how to extend Trump’s tax cuts, which expire for individuals next year, and agree to raise the debt limit — two difficult tasks that will almost certainly require horse-trading on both sides of the aisle.
Over the weekend, some of Trump’s allies on Capitol Hill voiced opposition to his plans to have the government pay for IVF or require insurance companies to cover the treatment. Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) told ABC’s “This Week” that he would not support the idea and proposed giving Americans a means-based tax credit to help them pay for IVF.
Sen. Markwayne Mullin (R-Okla.), meanwhile, expressed concern about the impact of such a policy on the deficit. “There’s going to be a problem with how you pay for it. There’s always that problem,” he said on CNN.
North Dakota Governor Doug Burgum rejected the idea that either candidate could fulfill their campaign promises for new government programs if they did not gain full control of Congress.
“There will be no mandates, there will be no freebies from Harris unless one party has control of both chambers, so a lot of this is electioneering and posturing,” he said. said in a separate interview on CNN.
With less than three months to go until the November election, both campaigns are more focused on the here and now: winning votes and motivating people to go to the polls. That’s why the candidates are avoiding the details in favor of an agenda They say it will help cost-conscious voters save money, especially at a time when high prices remain a major concern.
“Election promises can be more or less explicit. The more explicit they are, the more it looks like the candidate is trying to buy votes,” warned Todd Belt, a professor at George Washington University and director of the Program in Political Management.
“’Lowering the capital gains tax rate’ or ‘lowering the corporate tax rate’ are less explicit promises that don’t need to be explained to the constituencies that benefit from them. But the constituency certainly knows, and these promises fly under the radar,” he continued.
Whether a campaign idea counts as a “gift” depends on how easily voters can see who benefits from it, Belt added. “Promises are not new, but the way they are talked about varies.”
Trump and Harris will get a chance to discuss their campaign proposals during their first presidential debate, hosted by ABC News on Tuesday in Philadelphia.
