The House approved its budget resolution. There were no surprises in the package that passed.

The headlines numbers are the following: debt ceiling increase of $4 trillion, $4.5 trillion worth of tax cuts, $2 trillion of savings. There's some dynamic scoring shenanigans going on, but they're not crazy with a projection of 2.6% future economic growth on average.

CBO projects interest payments will nearly double from $952 billion in 2025 to $1.8 trillion by 2035, consuming 17% of federal spending, and debt-to-GDP would rise from 100% in 2025 to 133% by 2035.

The savings are spread through in the following way, directing House committees to find savings:

$880 billion from Energy and Commerce: Likely cuts to Medicaid via work requirements, provider reimbursements, or eligibility adjustments.

$330 billion from Education and Workforce: Likely reductions to Pell Grants and federal student loan subsidies.

$230 billion from Agriculture: Limits on farm subsidies and nutrition assistance programs.

On the tax side, the package includes the renewal of TCJA, including doubling the estate tax deduction and keeping the 20% pass-through deduction (great for small business), and a $2,000 CTC (reversing the $3,600 CTC for low income families under the 2021 bill).

When it comes to President Trump's 2024 tax proposals, the bill includes $100-$550 billion for service workers, contingent on achieving spending cuts, money for Social Security tax relief, and $100-200 billion in domestic production incentives. The bill doesn't touch SALT, however, reportedly to appease the House's fiscal conservatives, but the President may not like that.

Our favorite provision of the bill is an increase of the endowment tax from 1.4% to 21%.

Policy News You Need To Know

#VibeShift — Jeff Bezos has declared that his paper's editorial pages will frankly defend "two pillars: personal liberties and free markets." This is certainly a shift away from the quasi-communism that the Post has hitherto published, but the editorial line of The Economist circa 2005 is hardly a shift "to the right."

#VibeShift — Another "vibe shift…or not" moment: academia still hasn't received the message. In something that sounds like satire but is apparently real, the discipline of archaeology (a fascinating field) has ground to a halt. Why? "Displaying the bones of long-dead humans is now banned in museums and academic journals. Why? Because Native American activists say they’re cursed." More. It shouldn't be forgotten that in the US academia is a de facto extension of the state given the levels of taxpayer funding. Taxpayers should not allow anti-scientific pseudo-science to be funded by their dollars.

#VibeShift #Science — More on this line: the excellent Leor Sapir has a very good investigation into how the New England Journal of Medicine, one of the most prestigious journals of medicine in the country and in the world, has "capitulated to gender activists." Again: these people are welfare queens. Peer-reviewed journals exist because they charge extortionary subscription fees to taxpayer-funded universities, and they publish taxpayer-funded research. A determined government could end this in a matter of days.

#Immigration — "TSA has discontinued the use of the CBP One app." This infamously allowed illegal aliens to travel unmolested throughout the US by plane.

#Immigration #HSI — "Trump says in the next two weeks the United States will be selling a "Gold Card". A $5M purchasable green card that will allow you to work in this country and have a route to citizenship. This would be replacing the EB-5 program. […] Trump anticipates they may be able to sell a million cards which would be $5T and if they hypothetically sold 10M cards that would be $50T which would eliminate the national debt. This is completely in compliance with the law and doesn't need Congressional approval because it's a green card, not full citizenship." (Source) That way the US can import more people like Karine Jean-Pierre's family, who are ultrawealthy Haitian mobsters, whose children can then become ultra-privileged, ultra-woke, anti-American activists.

#Immigration — "The owner of a staffing agency in Charleroi, PA was just convicted for importing dozens of Haitians illegally into the U.S. […] He sheltered them in a nearby hotel and rented them out at rock-bottom wages, saving money by evading all taxes for them." (Source) This is important for two reasons. First, it vindicates some of the claims that were made about Haitians during the campaign, where the situation in Charleroi, PA became (along with Springfield, OH) and national flashpoint. Secondly, as we've told you previously, we are tracking immigration enforcement actions against business owners, to see how serious the Trump Administration's enforcement actions really are. Intelligently, they seem to be going after the least sympathetic people, in this case a guy who appears to have been running a quasi-slave system. All very smart politics: but again, things will get interesting if and when the Administration goes after farmers and other significant business owners.

#Trade — It looks like the White House is blessing the Nippon Steel deal, albeit with more promises of onshore investment from the Japanese. See, if you call it "investment", it's good! Populism is very funny sometimes.

#Healthcare — The White House just published a new EO mandating healthcare price transparency. This is certainly a move in the right direction, although it's unclear how much it can accomplish.

#Merica — New Pew: Decline of Christianity in the U.S. Has Slowed, May Have Leveled Off