Dem
47
GOP
53
Putting together a budget has a lot of moving parts. Many of Donald Trump's plans will cost the government a lot of money—for example, not taxing tips. Also getting the Republican representatives from California and New York on board will require raising the SALT cap, which is expensive. Just running a bigger deficit will drive the Freedom Caucus up the wall. Most potential budget cuts are going to anger at least some representatives. Putting together a bill and getting it through a 220R-213D House will be tough. As a consequence, some people in Trump's inner circle are contemplating the uncontemplatable: raising taxes on rich people.
In particular, J.D. Vance and OMB Director Russell Vought seem open to the idea. Of course, the donors who fund the Republican Party aren't going to be keen on it, but something has to give for Trump to get his bill through. Steve Bannon is quite enthusiastic about taxing the rich, as a way to defang the Democrats' expected "Eat the rich" 2026 election theme. That has already started, actually. The tour Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) are doing has as its theme "Fight Oligarchy":
They are drawing crowds of tens of thousands of people all over the country. Other Democrats are surely going to notice this is a winning issue. By increasing taxes on rich people, Republicans could claim this issue as their own. Still, it will be a tough climb to get this past a narrowly divided House. (V)