How Republicans Re-engineered the Tax Code
The New York Times ^ | July 4, 2025, 5:00 a.m. ET | Andrew Duehren
Posted on 07/04/2025 9:08:23 AM PDT by E. Pluribus Unum
The product of years of Republican effort, the American tax code now blends traditional supply-side economics with President Trump’s populist 2024 campaign promises.
When Republicans last set out to change taxation in America, they spent years combing through the details of the internal revenue code. They traveled the country, held hearings and drafted early versions of a bill, eventually passed in 2017, that they hoped would transform a sclerotic tax system with long-held conservative principles.
This time around, as Republicans prepared for another opportunity to change how taxes in the world’s largest economy are collected, their core ideas came not from a Washington think tank or corporate accountant. Instead, in President Trump’s telling, a waitress at his hotel in Las Vegas complained to him about having to pay taxes on her tips while he dined there during the 2024 campaign.
Soon, the seemingly offhand remark became a centerpiece of Mr. Trump’s successful campaign back into office. Republicans on Capitol Hill embraced the idea, too, and Congress this week voted to create a new tax exemption for tipped income for the next few years. At an event at the White House last month promoting the legislation, Mr. Trump credited the waitress with helping him win Nevada, where many people work for tips.
“A legend was made,” Mr. Trump said. “We won Nevada by so much. Republicans don’t win Nevada. We won Nevada. So I want to thank that young, beautiful waitress. Thank you very much.”
The tips provision, while ultimately only a sliver of the sprawling package that lawmakers passed this week, marked an important evolution in how the Republican Party, long dedicated to lowering taxes, has approached that goal. Rather than the type of systematic re-examination of the tax code that took place in...
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
TOPICS: Politics/Elections
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To: E. Pluribus Unum
2 posted on 07/04/2025 9:17:29 AM PDT by sauropod (Make sure Satan has to climb over a lot of Scripture to get to you. John MacArthur Ne supra crepidam)
To: E. Pluribus Unum
What a disgusting, misleading article. The NY Slimes know nothing about this bill.
3 posted on 07/04/2025 9:22:18 AM PDT by Kleon
To: E. Pluribus Unum
Vote buying in any form is bad.
To: E. Pluribus Unum
they already did the systematic part in 2017, and by extending it this year, they did it again.
So the 2025 tax bill is really a mix of systematic review and populist voter-attractive ideas like the tips tax reduction.
5 posted on 07/04/2025 9:23:41 AM PDT by ChronicMA
To: sauropod
"Rather than the type of systematic re-examination of the tax code that took place in 2017, the new Republican bill introduces a series of novel, populist and temporary cuts that Mr. Trump
developed by listening to the needs of regular workers and then doing something to directly help them out.
6 posted on 07/04/2025 9:26:08 AM PDT by catnipman ((A Vote For The Lesser Of Two Evils Still Counts As A Vote For Evil))
To: Brian Griffin
Letting workers keep more of their earnings is not vote buying. It is the opposite.
7 posted on 07/04/2025 9:31:23 AM PDT by bray (It's not racist to be racist against races the DNC hates.)
To: catnipman
They are just seething that the Republicans have become the party of the working class normal Americans and the Dem base is being reduced to elitists, freaks, illegal aliens, and various unemployable misfits.
8 posted on 07/04/2025 9:36:00 AM PDT by pburiak (You really think we can vote our way out of this? That's so cute...)
To: catnipman
“ Rather than the type of systematic re-examination of the tax code that took place in 2017”
The dishonest, purposefully misleading, propaganda spewing NYT fails to mention that this bill codifies those systematic changes that were passed in 2017. The only way Trump could get that through back then was to have an ending point.
9 posted on 07/04/2025 9:39:04 AM PDT by Freee-dame
To: Freee-dame
10 posted on 07/04/2025 9:55:15 AM PDT by sauropod (Make sure Satan has to climb over a lot of Scripture to get to you. John MacArthur Ne supra crepidam)
To: catnipman
11 posted on 07/04/2025 9:58:21 AM PDT by MotorCityBuck (Keep the change, you are filthy animal !)
To: Brian Griffin
Also known as “picking winners and losers” I figured that this was part of the price we had to pay to win the election, but I don’t like it one bit. But just mention that all income should be taxed so everyone has skin in the game and the baying hounds on this site will come at you with “tips are a gift, not income.”
12 posted on 07/04/2025 9:59:06 AM PDT by j.havenfarm (24 years on Free Republic, 12/10/24! More than 10,500 replies and still not shutting up!)
To: j.havenfarm
No income should be taxed.
13 posted on 07/04/2025 10:03:33 AM PDT by bankwalker (Feminists, like all Marxists, are ungrateful parasites.)
To: E. Pluribus Unum; All
14 posted on 07/04/2025 10:21:22 AM PDT by Amendment10
To: E. Pluribus Unum
Gonna make it harder for Dems to convince hospitality workers that Trump hates them.
15 posted on 07/04/2025 10:27:55 AM PDT by bigbob (Yes. We ARE going back)
To: Freee-dame
16 posted on 07/04/2025 10:44:15 AM PDT by quilterdebbie (We will endeavor to persevere!)
To: E. Pluribus Unum
Si did the New York Slimes print the truth for a change? ... Bwhahahahahaha
17 posted on 07/04/2025 11:06:55 AM PDT by antidemoncrat (In a way ge is right as)
To: bankwalker
I agree. But that’s not the world we live in
18 posted on 07/04/2025 11:25:20 AM PDT by j.havenfarm (24 years on Free Republic, 12/10/24! More than 10,500 replies and still not shutting up!)
To: j.havenfarm
I was happy the brackets are the same. As far as tips go, no tax affect. If we had a much higher percentage in house and senate, we could have expected more.
19 posted on 07/04/2025 12:41:30 PM PDT by Mouton (There is a new sheriff and deputy in town to now!)
To: E. Pluribus Unum
I wonder how many Las Vegas waitresses are going to claim to be The One who gave the idea to President Trump?
Maybe someone should start selling t-shirts on the Strip!
-PJ
20 posted on 07/04/2025 12:57:08 PM PDT by Political Junkie Too ( * LAAP = Left-wing Activist Agitprop Press (formerly known as the MSM))
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