It’s going to be a tough sell with Republicans.
President Donald Trump reportedly signaled Wednesday he is on board with hiking the federal gas tax by 25 cents in order to pay for his infrastructure plan.
As it stands right now, the federal tax is 18.4 cents per gallon on gasoline and 24.4 cents per gallon for diesel. Trump’s increase would raise the gasoline tax to 43.4 cents and diesel to just shy of 50 cents, CNBC reported .
Democratic Sen. Tom Carper says Trump was open to a one-time, 25 cent increase in gas and diesel taxes today in the WH meeting w/ lawmakers. “He said he knew it was a difficult thing for legislators to support and said that he would…provide the political cover to do that. »
— Ashley Killough (@KilloughCNN) February 14,2018
Some Republicans are nervous about the prospect of raising the federal gas tax so soon after passing tax cuts over concerns the higher gas tax will hurt middle-class families and undermine their legislative victory.
In fact, in 2015, House Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) rebuffed the idea, saying lawmakers “can’t just chase fuel efficiency with higher taxes,” according to The Hill:
“I want to make very clear: I’m against raising the gas tax. There’s not much happening in this economy to help it grow, but lower gas prices is one of them. Working families have been struggling for years to get by. They’ve looked high and low for good-paying jobs. Their paychecks haven’t grown much at all. And now they’re finally catching a break. It would be downright unfair to take that away from them. So we are not raising gas taxes — plain and simple.”
But for the White House, it doesn’t seem so “plain and simple.”
A Trump administration official told Axios the president wants “everything” under consideration “in order to achieve those goals,” referring to the White House’s call for a $1.5 trillion infrastructure investment.
“The gas tax has its pros and cons, and that’s why the president is leading a thoughtful discussion on the right way to solve our nation’s infrastructure problems,” the spokesperson said.
