They’re getting SALT-y.
Blue state Republican reps railed against rumored Senate plans to lower the state and local tax deduction (SALT) cap back down from the House-negotiated level of $40,000 to its current $10,000 threshold — vowing that it will be “dead on arrival.”
Ahead of the Senate Finance Committee’s release of its text for its modifications to the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, reporting from Punchbowl News indicated that the panel planned to chop down the SALT increase as a placeholder while negotiations play out.
The official text is slated to drop Monday evening, but multiple New York reps preemptively dubbed SALT pareback a dealbreaker.
“I have been clear since Day One: sufficiently lifting the SALT Cap to deliver tax fairness to New Yorkers has been my top priority in Congress,” Rep. Mike Lawler (R-NY) said in a statement.
“After engaging in good faith negotiations, we were able to increase the cap on SALT from $10,000 to $40,000. That is the deal, and I will not accept a penny less. If the Senate reduces the SALT number, I will vote NO, and the bill will fail in the House.”
Lawler doubled down on X, writing, “Consider this the response to the Senate’s “negotiating mark”: DEAD ON ARRIVAL” with a meme of Steve Carell as Michael Scott from “The Office” shaking his head.
The House passed the One Big Beautiful Bill Act last month, but the megabill next needs to clear the Senate and then survive the House again before it can get to President Trump’s desk.
Unlike the House, the Senate does not have any Republicans elected from high-taxed blue states where SALT is a pressing issue. Many Senate Republicans have openly grumbled over the inclusion of a SALT hike.
“I think at the end of the day, we’ll find a landing spot. Hopefully that will get the votes we need in the House, a compromise position on the SALT issue,” Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-SD) told “Fox News Sunday,” indicating that there isn’t an appetite in the upper chamber for a large SALT cap hike.
The House is home to the SALT Caucus, which includes blue state Republicans who have conditioned their support of the One Big Beautiful Bill Act on a SALT cap hike.
“The $40,000 SALT deduction was carefully negotiated,” Rep. Nicole Malliotakis (R-NY) said in a statement.
“For the Senate to leave the SALT deduction capped at $10,000 is not only insulting but a slap in the face to the Republican districts that delivered our majority and trifecta,” she added. “We have members representing blue states with high taxes that are subsidizing many red districts across the country.”
Republican SALT Caucus Co-Chairs Reps. Young Kim (Calif.) and Andrew Garbarino (NY) also warned that the leaked draft is “putting the entire bill at risk.”
“We have been crystal clear that the SALT deal we negotiated in good faith with the Speaker and the White House must remain in the final bill,” they said in a joint statement. “The Senate should work with us.”
Given the narrow 220 to 212 House GOP majority, leadership in the lower chamber cannot afford SALT-related defections. At most, House leadership can only afford three defections if there’s full attendance.
Meanwhile, passage of the One Big Beautiful Bill Act in the Senate has been complicated by fiscal hawks who have demanded that the megabill have less of an impact on the deficit.
The megabill is projected to increase the deficit by $3 trillion over the next decade, according to an estimate from the Congressional Budget Office. Senate Republicans are also keen on exploring ways of making certain temporary business tax cuts in the package permanent.
SALT emerged as a problem for blue state lawmakers after Republicans imposed a $10,000 cap on it in 2017 as part of the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act. The cap was intended to help pay for other provisions of the bill.
A spokesperson for the Senate Finance Committee declined to confirm whether or not the lowered SALT cap is in the panel’s draft of the megabill.
“Everyone will get accurate info when bill text is released,” the spokesperson said.
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