Oops, Turns Out Trump’s Megabill Actually Increased the Deficit

Be prepared for the Congressional Budget Office to stand revealed as an outpost of lunatic left Communists dedicated to undermining the glorious accomplishments of Your Favorite President. This is because the CBO has dropped the final price tag on the Big Plug Ugly. From Politico:

Over the next decade, the megabill Trump signed on July 4 would increase the federal deficit by $3.4 trillion and cause ten million people to lose health insurance, the Congressional Budget Office forecasts. While the newly enacted legislation would save more than $1 trillion by cutting federal spending on healthcare—with the majority coming from Medicaid—CBO predicts that the package’s costs will far outweigh its savings. The bulk of the red ink from the package comes from the GOP’s permanent extension of Trump’s 2017 tax cuts. The analysis finds that the Senate Finance Committee, which has jurisdiction over tax policy, enacted policies that would decrease the incoming federal cash flow from taxes by a total of $4.5 trillion. That sum includes the cost of tax cuts Republicans added during Senate floor debate of the package.

Of course, there’s always room for some concocted Republican chicanery.

At the request of Senate Republicans, CBO also included an analysis using a new accounting tactic that zeroes out the cost of permanently extending Trump’s 2017 tax cuts. Senate Republicans have argued that merely extending current tax rates shouldn’t be counted towards the deficit and that traditional accounting used by CBO biases against preventing tax increases.

Even with the GOP’s magical calculator, the bill increases the deficit by $366 billion. Sooner or later, you’re talking about real money.