Surprise, surprise

And just wait until the billionaire tax cuts go into effect.  Which reminds me, did you hear that Lindsey Graham says they're not going to count the current tax cuts in the accounting of the budget?

Senate leadership and Trump want to make the 2017 tax cuts permanent without having to account for how much it would add to the deficit. Now, they're saying all they need is for Budget Chair Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) to decide that's what they're going to do.

  Axios

As they stumble toward a budget bill, GOP lawmakers are also working to renew the tax cuts package from the 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act. As originally passed, those cuts were temporary—a necessity to make the budgetary math add up at the time. But because current law plans for them to expire, renewing them would (per traditional accounting rules) blow a brand new hole in the federal budget, spiking deficits by hundreds of billions of dollars a year.

[...]

So how do Republicans hope to surmount this messaging hurdle? By lying, mostly.

The current budget framework, approved by the Senate last week and by the House on Wednesday, takes an approach to assessing its impact on the deficit you might charitably call novel. Rather than scoring the framework on a “current law” baseline—as in, recognizing that the tax cuts are legally set to expire and being honest about the cost of renewing them in the budget framework—Republicans are using a “current policy” baseline: assessing the budget framework in contrast with tax levels as they stand today.

[...]

[I]t gives them permission to pretend that permanently renewing temporary tax cuts—which, again, had to be temporary to make the math work when they were originally passed—comes with a price tag of zero. It’s free real estate.

It’s hard to find an appropriate metaphor for how ridiculous this is, but Manhattan Institute economist Jessica Riedl took an admirable stab in the New York Times back in March. “Last year, despite being deeply in debt, I bought a $100,000 sports car. So next year, buying another $100,000 sports car is not irresponsible because I am merely spending the same amount of money as the year before,” she wrote. “And if I purchase ‘only’ a $70,000 car, then I should be congratulated for reducing my annual spending by $30,000.”

[...]

Supposed budget hardliners in the House folded en masse this week after Trump told them Tuesday night to “close your eyes and get there.” The sole exceptions were Reps. Victoria Spartz and Thomas Massie. Spartz—not exactly a typical voice of reason by reputation—hit the nail on the head here: “The instructions we voted on today,” she said, “are still setting us up for the largest deficit increase in the history of our Republic, & opening up a ‘pandora’s box’ by changing accounting rules to hide it.”

Massie was even more biting: “If you were trying to hasten financial collapse of our country and bribe voters to go along with it, the strategy wouldn’t look much different than what Congress is doing today. The big beautiful bill cuts taxes while keeping spending on an increasingly unsustainable trajectory.”

  The Bulwark

And they'd have every Republican voter screaming in unison if the Democrats had pulled such a scam.

If Republicans had adopted the customary “current law” baseline for the budget resolution, it would have required them to sunset an extension of the Trump tax cuts within the next decade.

By empowering Graham to set the budget baseline in such a way that an extension of Trump’s 2017 tax cuts is judged as not adding to the deficit after 2034, Republicans do not need to add language to sunset those tax cuts within the next decade to comply with the Senate’s Byrd Rule.

The Byrd Rule includes a test prohibiting legislation passed under budget reconciliation from adding to the deficit — either by increasing spending or reducing revenue — in the years beyond the budget window.

Republicans are using the budget reconciliation process to get Trump’s legislative agenda through the Senate with a simple-majority vote and avoid a Democratic filibuster.

If Graham adopts a budget baseline that judges an extension of the 2017 tax cuts as deficit-neutral, then Senate Republicans will feel less political pressure to come up with big spending cuts to offset their fiscal impact.

The resolution unveiled by Graham on Wednesday includes instructions to several committees to reduce the deficit, including the Senate Agriculture, Banking, Health and Energy and Natural Resources committees to reduce the deficit.

But even while they plan to cut spending, Senate Republicans acknowledge in their budget resolution that the deficit is likely to grow substantially over the next few years.

[...]

Elsewhere in Washington, Elon Musk and DOGE are leaving the federal bureaucracy a smoldering ruin, slashing and burning and tearing the wires out of the walls of the government. At a cabinet meeting yesterday, he proudly unveiled his total anticipated savings: $150 billion for fiscal year 2026. When I talk to Republican friends and family about DOGE, they point to these savings as a crucial step in finally getting a handle on our national debt—one well worth the destruction. But even if that number weren’t massively overinflated, which it absolutely, definitely is—all while being significantly smaller than the $2 trillion in savings Musk originally promised—its gains would be washed away many times over by the financial cost of this single congressional budgetary gimmick.

  MSN

After a flurry of overnight votes, the Republican-led Senate has approved a revised framework for a sweeping budget plan that is critical to President Trump's domestic agenda.

The 51-48 vote in the early morning hours on Saturday brings congressional Republicans one step closer to finalizing a sweeping multi-trillion dollar plan to address defense, energy, immigration and tax policy.

"This resolution is the first step toward a final bill to make permanent the tax relief we implemented in 2017 and deliver a transformational investment in our border, national, and energy security," said Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., ahead of the vote.

[...]

All together the Senate plan would allow for more than $5 trillion in tax cuts. The blueprint would extend the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act passed in 2017 under Trump's first term.

[...]

The bill also provides for an additional $1.5 trillion in new tax cuts.

[...]

The House, by comparison, has passed a budget framework that sets aside $4.5 trillion for tax cuts.

One of the biggest differences between the Senate plan and the House plan is how to pay for tax cuts. The bill directs both chambers to cut the deficit through spending cuts. While the Senate spending cuts are set at just around $4 billion, the House intends to cut at least $1.5 trillion. That includes a directive to the House Energy and Commerce Committee to cut $880 billion in spending, which has raised fear that those cuts can't happen without a significant hit to Medicaid benefits.

Senate Republicans are also hoping to use a procedural gimmick that would effectively work to make the $3.8 trillion it would take to extend the Trump tax cuts appear to cost nothing. It's a risky approach that is already causing tension between Republicans in the Senate and their House counterparts — and could prove one of the biggest obstacles to final passage.

To avoid a catastrophic financial default this summer, the Senate plan would raise the U.S. debt limit by $5 trillion. Without an increase, the government would be unable to issue new debt, which means it wouldn't have money to pay its bills, including the interest it owes to bondholders.

  NPR

Funny how urgent it is under Democratic leadership for the GOP to NOT raise the debt limit.

Economists warn that if the U.S. were to ever default on its debt, it would be disastrous not just for the U.S., but for the global economy. The Congressional Budget Office, Congress' nonpartisan scorekeeper, predicts that if lawmakers don't act, the U.S. may breach the debt limit by August or September.

[...]

The two chambers are likely headed for a high-stakes clash over how deep to go on deficit reduction, versus the cost of extending the Trump tax cuts and whether they'll have to cut into Medicaid to make it work.

We do this every fucking year.