The House of Representatives passed Republicans’ sweeping tax overhaul on Tuesday, sending the plan to the Senate and setting the stage for the bill to be signed by President Trump as early as this week.
The bill passed the House 227 to 203. All but 12 Republican members voted for the bill. Zero Democrats supported it. …
Senate Republicans are planning to vote Tuesday night. Party leaders appeared to have sewn up the bill’s passage Friday when holdout Republican Sens. Marco Rubio (Fla.) and Bob Corker (Tenn.) pledged their support. …
“Congress is standing at the doorstep of a historic opportunity,” Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) said as he announced plans for the Tuesday night vote. “Here’s what we set out to do: Take money out of Washington’s pockets and put it pack in the pockets of middle-class Americans.”
Pure fraudulence, but whatever. As I noted on Twitter, if there was a single thing that Republicans were going to succeed in doing once given total control in Washington, it was always going to be passing a huge tax cut for their wealthy donors.
Several provisions in the GOP’s sweeping tax bill violate the Senate’s procedural rules and will likely need to be removed, according to Senate aides. The House is expected to re-vote on the legislation Wednesday, after the Senate votes Tuesday night.
Apparently the Senate parliamentarian invalidated several provisions in the Senate bill (that are also in the House bill). Tomorrow’s vote is still a foregone conclusion. The raucous celebrating of this great achievement will just have to wait a day.
* Sophie Tatum has a list of the dozen House Republicans who voted No. They are all from New York, New Jersey, and California, where some taxpayers may see tax hikes due to limits the bill puts on deductions.
* White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders actually told this howler about the tax plan today:
“Look, we expect that it likely will, certainly on the personal side, could cost the president a lot of money.”
No, see, that’s a lie. Trump and his family will likely save tens of millions of dollars, and quite possibly a lot more.
A Republican seat flipped Democratic in a wild recount Tuesday — with the Democrat winning by a single vote — creating a rare 50-50 tie between the parties in the House of Delegates and refashioning the political landscape in Richmond.
Democrat Shelly Simonds emerged from the recount as the apparent winner in the 94th District of the House of Delegates, seizing the seat from Republican incumbent David Yancey. A three-judge panel still must certify the results, an event scheduled for Wednesday. …
The final tally: 11,608 for Simonds to 11,607 for Yancey.
This is the result of the huge Democratic rout in Virginia last month, and it means power will be shared in the House of Delegates, meaning, potentially, a more bipartisan agenda. Really, every vote does sometimes count! GOTV!
* Alice Ollstein reports that many House Republicans say the compromises to prop up Obamacare that Senator Susan Collins won in exchange for voting Yes on tax reform (which she will do in a matter of hours) just ain’t gonna happen. Nobody could have seen that coming!
* A new Quinnipiac poll finds that Trump’s approval is at a dismal 37-59. Even non-college whites are surprisingly split on whether Trump “shares their values” (47-49) or “cares about average Americans” (50-49).
* The Center on Budget and Policy Priorities has a useful set of charts showing what a huge giveaway to the rich the GOP tax bill is, particularly over time.
* Ron Brownstein explains how the Democratic win in Alabama has created a template for a “new southern strategy” that will make Democrats competitive in hostile territory — with Trump’s help.
* Paul Waldman is right about this: What the latest attacks on Robert Mueller really showcase is Republicans acting as if they believe Trump is guilty.
* David Frum explains how some conservative writers are caving to pressure to accommodate Trump, and why that could damage conservatism in the long run.
* Democratic pollster Zac McCrary has a very granular, data-based look at just how Doug Jones assembled the coalition that enabled him to narrowly prevail in deep red Alabama.
* John Stoehr makes the case that even if Trump tries to remove Robert Mueller, our democracy may still survive and thrive, because voters will make it so.
* And Jonathan Bernstein points to one of the big dangers of the Fox News anti-Mueller push: It could goad Trump into thinking he might get away with trying to remove him, and into going through with it.