Marc Short accused President Donald Trump’s new administration of abandoning his first term’s “free market approach” if they raise taxes on the wealthy, which a report suggests is under consideration.
Semafor’s Burgess Everett reported that the president told Senate Republicans he’d be “fine” with a proposal that would raise taxes on the country’s top earners, citing three people familiar with the meeting.
“I had to read that a few times and listen again when I was hearing lawmakers say that to me on Capitol Hill,” MSNBC’s Ali Vitali told Short on Thursday’s Way Too Early about the talk of tax hikes. “What does that tell you about where the party is right now? It’s a shift from the last time that you guys did tax policy.”
Short served as the director of legislative affairs under Trump in 2017 before going on to serve as then-Vice President Mike Pence’s chief of staff.
Short called the proposed tax hike under Trump a “giant shift” from his experience working with him.
“It’s a giant shift. I think that where we were in 2017 was a pretty conservative, free market approach to pro-growth policies,” he said.
He added that there are likely populist Republicans who believe raising taxes will poll well despite the proposal being mostly at odds with traditional Republican policy.
“I think what you see now is the latest shift towards populism inside the party where there are probably some people who think, well, this polls well. I think it’s terrible economics. I think it’s terrible policy,” Short said.
He also accused Republicans of not being “honest” with Americans when they say they will not be touching services like Medicaid while they seek to enact cuts in federal government spending. Short noted that the number of people on Medicaid has increased by tens of millions since 2017.
“We’re not being honest with the American people if we’re saying we’re not going to touch it at all,” Short said.
Watch above via MSNBC.
