GOP to Offer Agenda in Small Doses

House Republicans, frustrated over President Clinton’s veto of their $792-billion omnibus tax cut bill last year, unveiled a new strategy Thursday--splitting the measure’s key elements into a series of separate bills and passing them one at a time.

The GOP leaders believe that, with the 2000 elections looming, this approach will attract more Democratic support for many of the tax cut provisions and at the same time make it more difficult for Clinton to reject them.

Speaker J. Dennis Hastert (R-Ill.) said that the first major bill Congress will take up when it reconvenes later this month will propose easing the so-called marriage penalty--the tax laws that force many couples to pay more filing jointly than they would as single taxpayers.

Hastert said that the marriage-penalty bill would be followed quickly by two others--one to provide tax-deferred savings accounts for education costs and another to offer tax breaks to businesses for creating jobs and cleaning up the environment in poor, rural communities.

GOP strategists said that the three measures would only be the beginning. Republicans would follow with about half a dozen bills containing other provisions of the 1999 tax cut bill, possibly including estate-tax relief and a cut in capital gains taxes.

Republican strategists concluded last year that one reason Clinton was able to veto the omnibus bill without any discernible public backlash was that the $792-billion price tag enabled him to divert attention from the substance of the provisions to their overall cost.

The shift in strategy was hailed by conservative analysts. Marshall Wittmann, Congress-watcher for the Heritage Foundation, said that the new GOP plan would intensify pressure on Democrats, including Clinton, to endorse the individual tax cut proposals.

“Bite-sized tax cuts are much more politically digestible,” Wittmann said. “This is a much more politically prudent course than the Republicans were following last year, and it’s likely to result in more of these provisions actually becoming law.”

Dan Maffei, a spokesman for Democrats on the House Ways and Means Committee, agreed, at least in part. “Democrats have said all along that they would accept several pieces of the tax package if it wasn’t so bloated,” he said--particularly the marriage penalty provision.

But the House strategy faces a potentially lukewarm reception in the Senate, where some Republicans fear that splitting up the tax bill would only give Democrats more chances to load the measures with extra provisions.

At least some Republicans also fear that the new slice-and-dice approach contains a broader political risk for the GOP--by opening the way for Vice President Al Gore and the Democrats to steal the credit for passage of some of the bills. “I worry about letting Gore do those Rose Garden ceremonies” signing popular tax-relief bills, one strategist said.

Hastert told reporters Thursday that House Republicans would reconsider their plans once the party chooses a presidential nominee. “This is just a start,” he said. “We intend, whoever the presidential candidate will be, to coordinate as much as possible.”

The GOP’s front-runner, Texas Gov. George W. Bush, recently proposed a sweeping plan that would cut taxes by $483 billion over five years. Its provisions include reducing the marriage penalty. It also would slash income tax rates, eliminate inheritance taxes and double the tax credit for children to $1,000 annually.

Hastert told reporters Thursday that House leaders still had not worked out the details of the marriage-penalty bill or any of the other legislation that they are planning but said it could be similar to the provisions passed last year.

The tax cut bill Congress sent to Clinton in 1999 would have reduced the marriage penalty gradually by doubling the standard deduction and increasing the amount of income subject to the lowest tax bracket for couples filing jointly. The provision would have cost the Treasury an estimated $119 billion over 10 years.

Hastert’s announcement came as House Republicans prepared to wrap up a two-day strategy session called to hammer out their legislative agenda for 2000. Besides the tax cuts, it includes continuing to seek a balanced budget and to keep the Social Security surplus intact.

Hastert said that Republicans also plan soon to unveil a plan to pay off the remainder of the national debt more quickly than is currently envisioned “so that our children will inherit a debt-free country.”

Both Democrats and Republicans agree that if the budget remains in surplus and the country continues to enjoy strong economic growth, the national debt most likely will disappear by the year 2020. Tax revenue not spent by the government goes automatically to pay down the debt.

Although Hastert declined to provide any details, GOP strategists said that Republicans will probably propose earmarking part of the federal budget to pay down the debt each year so the process could be completed by 2015 or so.

Because the government has been running large surpluses the last two years, the Treasury has been able to reduce the national debt by $300 billion a year. The debt now is $3.6 trillion.

The GOP announcement came a day after President Clinton unveiled plans to seek $1.3 billion in new loans and grants to help repair and renovate local school buildings. He also will renew a request for $3.7 billion to underwrite local construction bonds for school renovation.

He and Democratic congressional leaders also reiterated that they will press for passage of Democratic measures rejected or shelved last year. Among them are gun control, medical insurance reform, hate-crimes legislation and a boost in the minimum wage.