The Republican megabill the President Trump signed into law a month ago will add $4.1 trillion to the deficit over 10 years, the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office said Monday, adding that the cost could rise to $5 trillion if the new law’s temporary tax provisions were made permanent.
The $4.1 trillion total includes $718 billion in additional interest costs, which would rise to $789 billion if the tax cuts scheduled to sunset after four or five years, including those on tips and overtime pay, get extended.
The latest projections for debt-service costs are higher than the $440 billion CBO forecast in a June analysis of the House version of the legislation, completed before Senate Republicans made changes to the package.
Sen. Jeff Merkley of Oregon, the top Democrat on the Senate Budget Committee, requested the analysis to provide what he argues is a more accurate assessment of Republicans’ plan.
“Each and every analysis from the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office continues to show the same result regardless of how you look at it: this bill explodes the debt by trillions of dollars to fund tax breaks for billionaires,” Merkley said in a statement. “Republicans can’t spin the fact that this bill is bad policy that kicks more than 15 million people off of their health insurance, will force millions of kids to go hungry, and explodes the national debt by $5 trillion over the next 10 years — pushing the cost of this bill onto future generations to ensure billionaires can pay less in taxes. It is the height of hypocrisy coming from the party that claims to be fiscally responsible.”