The White House will meet with business leaders to discuss tax reform.
Since the release of President Donald Trump’s one-page tax plan summary two months ago, White House officials have met with lawmakers as they plan to draft legislation. Now, the officials will meet with industry leaders who remain eager to make their tax reform priorities known.
Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin and National Economic Council Director Gary Cohn will meet with executives from the transportation industry on Tuesday. A White House spokeswoman said that the gathering counts as one of a dozen such meetings the White House will hold with business leaders across various sectors of the American economy.
The listening sessions could help stakeholders get a pulse for how industry leaders feel about different planks of tax reform and eventually get business leaders behind a tax reform package.
Former Rep. Phil English (R-PA), who is a senior government relations adviser at Arent Fox, said, “I think they’re indispensable.”
English added, “The only way to get to tax reform is if the administration gets … very diverse sets of interests in the business community and the economy to join hands.”
Former Congressman Rick Lazio (R-NY), now a senior vice president of the tax consulting firm Alliantgroup, said that the meetings would help the White House make sure that it is not missing any potential side effects of tax reform.
Republicans hope to enact tax reform to boost economic growth and encourage jobs to come back from overseas.
Lisa Zarlenga, co-chairwoman of the tax group at Steptoe & Johnson, explained that meeting with industry leaders will give White House officials “a sense of what it will take to change the way businesses are operating.”
Industry associations have found meetings with the Trump White House productive.
“I think listening sessions are a compelling way to build the relationships and foster the understanding necessary to move to the next step,” said David French, the senior vice president for government relations at the National Retail Federation. French’s group met with Mnuchin last month.
The Retail Industry Leaders Association (RILA) also met with Mnuchin in May. RILA spokesman Brian Doge said that the Treasury Secretary had a “remarkable understanding of the retail industry” and “quickly grasped” retailers’ concerns about the border adjustment tax (BAT) in Speaker Paul Ryan’s tax plan. A BAT would exempt exports while taxing imports.
Steve Taylor, the director of government relations for United Way Worldwide, explained that his group would like to meet with the White House about how Trump’s tax plan could negatively affect charitable giving.
Taylor said, “We’re really hoping that we get an opportunity to go in and explain why there would be such a negative impact.”
President Trump’s tax plan would retain charitable deductions, but it would also reduce the number of people who can take the deduction,, because the tax plan also increases the standard deduction. Taylor laments that this could have “unintended consequences” that could lower charitable deductions. United Way Worldwide wants the Trump administration to allow people to deduct their charitable donations, even if they take the standard deduction.
The White House and Republican leadership want to devise a tax plan with one bill that can pass through the Congress and that Trump can sign.
Gary Cohn told Fox Business that the White House will reveal a more detailed tax plan “by the end of the summer.”
Cohn said, “We will have a very detailed drafted tax plan to be delivered to Congress by when they get back from the August recess.”
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