Republican Agenda Hits Familiar Obstacle: State and Local Taxes

Gerhard Randers-Pehrson, an 81-year-old resident of Ossining, N.Y., believes the $10,000 cap should go up — but not too much. While Mr. Randers-Pehrson, a retired research scientist, said he paid $16,000 in state and local taxes last year, he does not expect to personally benefit from a higher cap. He would take the standard deduction instead of itemizing. But the issue still bothers him.

“I don’t think we should punish areas that try to do right by the municipal services they provide,” he said. His congressman, Representative Mike Lawler, a Republican and one of the holdouts on the issue, has proposed lifting the cap to $100,000 for individuals and $200,000 for married couples. Mr. Randers-Pehrson believes such an increase would be too high.

Even among Republicans who want to raise the limit, agreeing on a demand has been a challenge.

Representative Jeff Van Drew, Republican of New Jersey, has said that a cap around $30,000 or $40,000 would be acceptable, while a group of four New York Republicans put out a statement on Thursday calling a $30,000 cap “insulting.” Representative Young Kim, Republican of California, recently floated a $62,000 deduction per individual. Representative Nicole Malliotakis, a New York Republican on the Ways and Means Committee, meanwhile, has suggested that Americans under a certain income limit should be able to take the full deduction.

“I was always focused on people that I represent in Staten Island and Brooklyn, who mostly all make under $500,000,” she said.

House Republican leaders remain optimistic they can thread the needle. Beyond SALT, they are also grappling with a last-minute push from Mr. Trump to raise taxes on the rich, though the president appeared to again back away from that idea in a social media post on Friday. “Republicans should probably not do it, but I’m OK if they do!” the president wrote.