Top House conservative offers ‘red line’ on tax reform

House Freedom Caucus Chairman Mark Meadows (R-N.C.) on Tuesday outlined what he considers his minimum “red line” for tax reform as the GOP prepares to release a proposed blueprint.

Meadows said he would vote against a tax reform measure if it included a corporate tax rate higher than 20 percent, set a small-business rate at more than 25 percent, and didn’t double the standard deduction for individuals.

The conservative lawmaker emphasized that those parameters are his personal view and do not reflect the demands of the entire roughly 40-member House Freedom Caucus.

“That has to be the red line. You don’t start there and go up,” Meadows said at a Capitol Hill event moderated by the Heritage Foundation.

{mosads}House Republicans will hold a partial-day retreat on Wednesday at the National Defense University in Washington to discuss a tax reform framework meant to serve as a guideline for committees crafting legislation.

Details of the plan by House and Senate GOP leaders and the White House have begun to emerge ahead of its unveiling.

The top individual rate is expected to be lowered from 39.6 percent to 35 percent, while the lowest rate is expected to be increased from 10 percent to 12 percent.

Trump said Tuesday that the tax plan will also include “nearly doubling” the standard deduction and increasing the child tax credit.

“We will cut taxes tremendously for the middle class. Not just a little bit but tremendously,” Trump said at the White House while meeting with a bipartisan group of House Ways and Means Committee members.

— Naomi Jagoda contributed.