GOP flirts with magical thinking on paying for Trump's tax cuts

Zoom in: Scott Bessent, Trump's nominee for Treasury secretary, has privately indicated to senators that he's sympathetic to their view that the cost of extending the 2017 tax cuts should be zero, according to people familiar with the matter.

By the numbers: Under a "current law baseline," extending Trump's personal and estate tax cuts will cost $4 trillion over 10 years.

• The tax cuts expire at the end of 2025, and the Congressional Budget Office has to score how much revenue the Treasury will miss if Congress passes it for another 10 years.
• But what if Congress runs the numbers from a different starting point, and considers "current policy"?
• Current policy has the tax cuts in place (at least until the end of the year). Among friends, say Republicans, what if we use current policy as the baseline? Then extending the tax cuts will cost … zero.

Between the lines: This fall, while still in the minority, Senate Finance Chair Mike Crapo (R-Idaho) started talking about using a current policy approach.

• That strategy appears to be gaining momentum, especially in the Senate. House Ways and Means Chair Jason Smith (R-Mo.) is also on board.
• The two Budget Committee chairs, Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) and Rep. Jodey Arrington (R-Texas) haven't tipped their hands on their preferred approach.

The bottom line: Republicans are seizing on the "current policy" paradigm in 2025, but plenty of Obama officials (including Jeff Zients, President Biden's current chief of staff) were for it in 2013.