(Washington) The Democratic leader of the House of Representatives Nancy Pelosi said Sunday that the elected officials of her party could reach a compromise in the coming week on the content of the vast reforms aspired by Joe Biden.
As Economy Minister Janet Yellen, Mme Pelosi also spoke on Sunday of the possibility that these reforms are partly funded by a tax on assets held by the richest people in the United States.
“We’re almost there,” the official said on CNN, also responding “that’s what is planned”, to the question of whether the agreement would be reached in the week.
“We have an agreement on 90% of the project, we just have some of the last decisions to make,” she also said.
Joe Biden received Sunday morning in his Delaware residence the Democratic leader of the Senate Chuck Schumer, and Senator Joe Manchin, one of the elected Democrats refractory to parts of the social reform project.
PHOTO J. SCOTT APPLEWHITE, ARCHIVES ASSOCIATED PRESS
West Virginia Senator Joe Manchin, one of the Democrats who are resistant to parts of the social reform bill
The White House called the interview with Mr. Manchin a “fruitful discussion.” “They continued to move forward, they will make their teams work on the rest of the meeting and have agreed to stay in close contact”, communicated the White House.
To finance the project, “we will probably have a tax on the rich,” Mme Pelosi stressing that this option was still under discussion among Democratic senators. It would at best finance 10% of the project, also indicated the person in charge.
Mme Yellen later clarified on CNN that the proposal raised by Mr.me Pelosi was that of Senator Ron Wyden. It plans to tax each year the capital gains generated, but not cashed, by liquid assets held by billionaires, those that can be quickly transformed into cash such as shares.
“I wouldn’t call it a tax on the rich,” Mr.me Yellen. “But this would make it easier to achieve gains on capital, which represent an extremely important part of the income of the richest people and which currently are not taxed” until they are sold, she added. .
The proposal would affect people with more than $ 1 billion in assets or with more than $ 100 million in income over three years, or less than 1,000 U.S. taxpayers, according to the Wall Street Journal.
The US president expressed cautious optimism on Thursday about the possibility of an agreement in Congress to push through his social reform project and his infrastructure plan.
The amounts have been planed in an attempt to bring together all the fringes of the Democratic Party.
Joe Biden notably led during the week intensive negotiations with reluctant elected officials during which he agreed to drastically reduce spending on social and climate measures.
West Virginia Senator Joe Manchin and Arizona Senator Kyrsten Sinema, two centrist Democrats, have the equivalent of a veto on these projects in the face of the extremely thin majority of Democrats in the upper house of Congress .
The American president initially wanted to vote for a program of 3,500 billion dollars over 10 years to improve the care of health, education and early childhood. During discussions within his party, this amount was reduced to around 2 trillion.
The other $ 1.2 trillion program involves investments to modernize infrastructure.