Trump, Johnson Pour Cold Water on Proposal to Raise Top Marginal Rates

Asked whether such a proposal could make it into Republicans’ final funding package, House Speaker Mike Johnson replied, ‘I would not expect that.’

Speaker of House Mike Johnson (R-La.) speaks at a press conference at the U.S. Capitol in Washington, on Feb. 5, 2025. Win McNamee/Getty Images

House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) said he doesn’t expect that Republicans will pursue a tax increase for the wealthiest American earners, squelching long-circulating speculation that top marginal tax rates might be allowed to increase under the GOP budget proposal.

President Donald Trump also indicated in comments to the press from the Oval Office that he is uninterested in pursuing the proposal further.

In an April 23 interview with Johnson, Fox News anchor Will Cain cited reports that Trump was considering pushing the top marginal tax rates to about 39 or 40 percent to cover his campaign promise of “No taxes on tips.”

Asked whether such a proposal could make it into Republicans’ final funding package, dubbed the “big beautiful bill,” Johnson replied, “I would not expect that.”

“I’m not in favor of raising the tax rates because our party is the party that stands against that,” Johnson said, while acknowledging that the idea had been thrown around as one of many possible ways to make personal income tax cuts permanent in the final package.

“There were lots of ideas thrown out on the table along this process over the last year, but I would just say for everybody, just wait and see,” Johnson said.

Trump, who some initially speculated was eyeing the plan, also came out against it on April 23, telling reporters it would be “very disruptive” and expressing concerns that such a proposal could cause the wealthy to leave the country.

“You know, in the old days, they left states. They go from one state to the other. Now ... they leave countries. You lose a lot of money if you do that,” Trump said.

Under the reconciliation process being used to pass the mammoth package—which will include funding for the border and immigration enforcement, energy, and defense as well as tax policy—Senate Republicans are hoping to make the tax cuts that were included in Trump’s 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act permanent.

They’re also looking for a way to pay for Trump’s no taxes on tips proposal.

The Byrd Rule of the reconciliation process requires that any policy that would affect the federal deficit after 10 years must be sunset unless its cost is offset by other measures.

In early April, Senate Republicans told The Epoch Times that they were investigating the possibility of letting the tax cuts for the top marginal earners expire and revert to their pre-2017 levels.

“We’ve talked about a lot of different scenarios. That is one possibility,” Sen. Mike Rounds (R-S.D.) told The Epoch Times on April 3.

“That has been floated. There’s a ton of things; cutting the rate has also been floated,” Sen. James Lankford (R-Okla.) said.

With Trump and Johnson both taking a firm stance against this proposal, senators are likely to pursue alternative methods for making the cuts permanent.

Arjun Singh contributed to this report.