Nathan L. Gonzales | (TNS) CQ-Roll Call

WASHINGTON — The House battleground continues to take shape two months before Election Day. While a handful of the top Senate races have been engaged for months with torrents of television ads, most House races are just now doing the same. And with the uncertainty at the top of the Democratic presidential ticket, the down-ballot fight was in a holding pattern for much of the summer.

Until his departure from the race on July 21, President Joe Biden was headed for defeat by former President Donald Trump and threatened to torpedo Democratic chances of winning the House and holding the Senate. Now, with Vice President Kamala Harris as the Democratic presidential nominee, the party’s congressional candidates have a better, albeit still slim, chance of holding the Senate and are firmly in the fight for the House majority.

The path to a majority has been slightly easier for Republicans throughout the cycle. While Democrats have needed to win nine of the 10 races rated as Toss-ups by Inside Elections to get to 218 (as long as they win all of the races rated as Solid, Likely, Lean and Tilt Democratic), Republicans needed to win just two rated as Toss-up.

The silver lining for Democrats has been that Biden finished ahead of Trump in nine of the 10 Toss-ups in 2020 in an era with minimal ticket-splitting. But Biden was on track to finish behind Trump in the Toss-up districts, as well as many in the Tilt and Lean categories and probably some in Likely Democratic. That was a death sentence to Democrats’ chances in the House and fueled the pressure for Biden to drop out of the race.

Now, public and private polling shows Harris is matching or exceeding Biden’s 2020 performance, pulling close in the presidential race and improving Democrats’ chances of gaining the four seats they need.

The seven recent rating changes are split nearly evenly between the two parties.

Democrats’ chances improved in four races: California’s 45th (GOP Rep. Michelle Steel) from Lean Republican to Tilt Republican, Nebraska’s 2nd (GOP Rep. Don Bacon) from Tilt Republican to Toss-up, Pennsylvania’s 17th (Democratic Rep. Chris Deluzio) from Lean Democratic to Likely Democratic and Washington’s 8th (Democratic Rep. Kim Schrier) from Likely Democratic to Solid Democratic.

Republicans’ chances improved in three races: Michigan’s 8th (Democratic Rep. Dan Kildee’s open seat) from Tilt Democratic to Toss-up, New York’s 17th (GOP Rep. Mike Lawler) from Toss-up to Tilt Republican and Virginia’s 7th (Democratic Rep. Abigail Spanberger’s open seat) from Tilt Democratic to Toss-up.

The changes are a microcosm of the overall battle for the House. GOP incumbents such as Steel and Bacon are more vulnerable with Trump doing poorly in their districts, while Democrats are going to have a tough time defending open seats like the pair in Michigan and one in Virginia.

With the latest rating changes, the House battlefield comprises 82 districts (45 currently held by Democrats and 37 currently held by Republicans) and the path to 218 still looks easier for Republicans. They need to win just two of the dozen Toss-ups, while Democrats need to win 11 of 12. But that understates Democrats’ opportunity. If Harris continues to perform well at the top of the ticket, Democratic prospects will improve.

The next couple of weeks will bring more clarity to the fight for the House with a slew of private polling, as party strategists make critical campaign spending decisions, and some public polling. Inside Elections just released its third House battleground poll on Wednesday, in partnership with Noble Predictive Insights. The survey of Oregon’s 5th District follows polls in Michigan’s 7th and Ohio’s 9th districts.

Inside Elections’ House projection is still a range of a Democratic gain of five seats to a Republican gain of five seats, with control contained within. That means every seat will matter, and it could be weeks before we know which party controls the chamber because of multiple competitive races in California, New York and Pennsylvania, where it can take a while to count ballots.

Moved toward Democrats

California’s 45th (Michelle Steel, R) from Lean Republican to Tilt Republican
Nebraska’s 2nd (Don Bacon, R) from Tilt Republican to Toss-up
Pennsylvania’s 17th (Chris Deluzio, D) from Lean Democratic to Likely Democratic
Washington’s 8th (Kim Schrier, D) from Likely Democratic to Solid Democratic

Moved toward Republicans

Michigan’s 8th (Open; Dan Kildee, D) from Tilt Democratic to Toss-up
New York’s 17th (Mike Lawler, R) from Toss-up to Tilt Republican
Virginia’s 7th (Open; Abigail Spanberger, D) from Tilt Democratic to Toss-up

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Nathan L. Gonzales is an elections analyst with CQ Roll Call.

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©2024 CQ-Roll Call, Inc., All Rights Reserved. Visit cqrollcall.com. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.

Erik Wasson and Enda Curran | (TNS) Bloomberg News

WASHINGTON — Republican nominee Donald Trump and running mate JD Vance are campaigning on a grab bag of tax cut proposals that could collectively cost as much as $10.5 trillion over a decade, a massive sum that would exceed the combined budgets of every domestic federal agency.

Even if Congress were to eliminate every dollar of nondefense discretionary spending — projected to be $9.8 trillion over the next 10 years — it still wouldn’t offset the estimated expense of the wide-ranging tax cuts Trump and Vance have floated in recent weeks.

The price tag is based on rough, initial estimates from tax and budget specialists because the Trump campaign hasn’t released detailed policy plans for its tax promises.

The Trump campaign said in a statement the former president will cut wasteful spending and increase energy production to pay for the tax cuts and lower the national debt. The campaign didn’t offer more detail.

Though Democrat Kamala Harris also has proposed a few large tax cuts — she would exempt tips from taxation and expand the child tax credit — the impact on the nation’s finances pales in comparison. She calls for offsetting the lost income, which one think tank estimates at roughly $2 trillion, with tax increases on corporations and wealthy individuals.

Harris is continuing to roll out policy ideas piecemeal, which could add to that total. On Tuesday, she called for an expanded deduction for start-up businesses and her campaign has signaled that more policy plans could be released in the coming weeks. On Wednesday, she proposed increasing the capital gains tax rate to 28% from 20%, which would raise federal revenue.

The sheer magnitude of the Trump campaign’s tax promises make it highly unlikely they all would pass even in a Congress controlled by Trump allies. The Republican ticket’s tax proposals include extending Trump’s 2017 tax cuts, a big expansion to the child tax credit and exemptions for tips and Social Security payments.

“Congress is not going to pass a $10 trillion deficit-financed tax cut,” said Kyle Pomerleau, a senior fellow with the right-leaning American Enterprise Institute.

Republicans have long argued that tax cuts boost growth. But it’s not clear how much Trump’s proposals, which largely cut levies for individuals rather than businesses, would spur new economic activity.

The combined cost of the Trump plans is so big that if Congress were to try to pass the tax cut proposals and keep spending flat, it means they could continue to fund the military, federal benefit programs, like Social Security, pay interest on the debt — and nothing else. That means eliminating major federal agencies that handle duties such as law enforcement, border security, air traffic control, tax collection and international relations.

Trump’s supporters are accustomed to his impromptu, broad-stroke policy pronouncements, while some key Democratic constituency groups demand detailed policy proposals from their candidates and a firm plan offsetting the cost.

Harris and President Joe Biden released a detailed budget proposal this year to cut federal deficits $3 trillion over a decade, by raising taxes on corporations and wealthy individuals and other measures. Those plans mirror some of the offsets Harris has proposed but previously have run into powerful opposition from major business lobbies.

Without those compensating tax increases, the Harris proposals could increase the deficit by as much as $2 trillion over the next decade, according to the University of Pennsylvania Penn Wharton Budget Model.

Tax Agenda

For both candidates, much will hinge on how well their party does in congressional elections, said Wendy Edelberg, a former Federal Reserve and Congressional Budget Office economist who’s now director of the Brookings Institution’s Hamilton Project.

The outlook “depends on a million different factors, particularly the balance of power in Congress,” Edelberg said. “Perhaps no policy will get enacted as specifically proposed by either candidate.”

Taxes will be a top agenda item in Congress next year, regardless of who wins the White House or which party controls the House and Senate. Major portions of Trump’s 2017 tax cuts — including lower individual rates and deduction for small businesses — expire at the end of 2025, which will force Congress to address the tax code next year.

Trump has made extending his signature tax law the centerpiece of his agenda. The Congressional Budget Office says that would cost $4.6 trillion over 10 years. He’s also floated lowering the corporate rate to 15% from 21%, adding another $874 billion to the total, according to a budget model by the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget.

On the campaign trail, the Republican ticket has verbally floated more tax ideas with hefty price tags: excluding Social Security payments from taxes ($1.8 trillion), exempting taxes on tipped wages ($250 billion) and increasing the $2,000 child tax credit per child to $5,000 ($3 trillion).

Added all up, that’s $10.5 trillion. If Congress were to seriously consider these ideas, official federal scorekeepers would model out the effects, including how the tax cuts interact with one another.

Revenue Raisers

Trump has offered very few options to raise more federal revenue. He has vowed to block any cuts to Medicare and Social Security benefits and has called for an increase in military spending. He’s proposed universal tariffs ranging from 10% to 20%. The left-leaning Urban-Brookings Tax Policy Center has estimated a 10% across-the-board levy could raise $2.8 trillion over 10 years.

That has the potential to cover some of the cost of his tax cuts, but doesn’t take into account what economists warn are large negative economic growth effects or the cost of compensating farmers for trade retaliation from other countries.

The rising national debt is already stoking concern among investors and ratings agencies.

Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell has warned that higher government budget deficits are on an unsustainable path. In November, Moody’s Investors Service signaled it could downgrade the U.S. from the highest investment grade, Aaa.

CBO projects federal debt held by the public will exceed 100% of the GDP next year and rise to 122% in 10 years without any new tax cuts.

“The fiscally responsible thing for either candidate to do, if they are proposing tax cuts, is to tell us how they are going to pay for them,” said Keith Hall of George Mason University, who once led the nonpartisan CBO.

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©2024 Bloomberg L.P. Visit bloomberg.com. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.