Sen. Rand Paul: Trump’s tax plan could lead to middle class tax hike

Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) discussed President Trump’s tax reform plan on Friday, telling the FOX Business Network’s Maria Bartiromo, “I’m absolutely for cutting taxes.” But Paul pointed to one item in the plan that needed to be sorted out before he was fully on board with it.

“The only sticking point I’ve had is a detail, but it’s an important detail: if you keep the middle rate at 25% and you get rid of two big deductions, how do we prevent the middle class from having a tax increase on this?,” he asked on “Mornings with Maria.”

But Paul seemed confident the administration would fix the issue, telling Bartiromo, “I talked to the president yesterday about this, I talked to the budget director Mick Mulvaney. They assure me they’re not going to let it happen.”

When Bartiromo asked what happened to the notion of trickle-down economics, Paul responded, “You have Republicans who have insufficient confidence in capitalism.”

Paul supports a cut in the top tax rate, saying “I would like to see everybody get a tax cut, including the wealthy.”

But according to Paul, a tax reform plan had to include middle income tax cuts as well.

“I’m all for cutting the top rate. I’m also for making sure we cut the middle rate. You can’t just cut the top rate and not cut the middle rate, you have to protect the middle income people because there is a lot of us.”