President Donald Trump loves to boast about the sprawling size and scope of his domestic policy law. But the White House’s plan to sell voters on his signature, broadly unpopular legislation increasingly relies on the appeal of a single issue: Lower taxes.
Trump administration officials have narrowed their rhetoric since passing the multitrillion-dollar bill, focusing on a small handful of tax provisions that they believe will resonate with Americans in the run-up to next year’s midterm elections.
The more focused messaging effort represents a significant departure from the White House’s stance earlier this year, when Trump insisted on passing as wide-ranging a package as possible so that “there’s something for everyone.”
It’s easy to see why. The tax policies — including deeper cuts for individuals and businesses and the elimination of certain taxes on tips and overtime — are among the most popular elements of a law that has so far proven decidedly unpopular as a whole. And as White House aides and allies try to bolster the perception of Trump’s central legislative accomplishment ahead of the midterm elections, they’re hoping that the financial benefits that could show up as early as next year will eventually outweigh voters’ concerns about the law’s broader impact on health care and more.
“Yes, it is a big, beautiful bill — but the tax digest next year says it’s going to save the average Georgian $3,600 on their income tax,” said Bruce LeVell, a longtime Trump ally and Georgia businessman. “It’s a great thing to sell to the American people to make sure they’re very clear how this is going to impact their wallets.”
Vice President JD Vance is expected to amplify the tax-specific appeal during a visit to Georgia on Thursday, where he’s slated to tout the law in a speech at an industrial refrigeration manufacturing facility outside Atlanta.
The event is the second stop in a tour of battleground states and districts that Vance plans to continue into the fall. Yet after an initial speech on the new law in Pennsylvania that touched on a range of themes, including immigration and trade, officials ahead of his Georgia appearance signaled that Vance planned to make a more concentrated push. This time, he’s expected to focus on what the administration has cast as “working families tax cuts.”
In a statement, Vance communications director Will Martin highlighted provisions increasing the child tax credit and creating a new tax deduction for older Americans — while vowing to attack vulnerable Georgia Democratic Sen. Jon Ossoff for voting against the broader domestic policy law.
That approach, Republicans hope, will help shift voters’ focus toward the financial issues that that are typically advantageous for the GOP, and away from topics like health care that have consistently dragged the party down in past election cycles.
The effort to message the legislation primarily as a tax bill benefiting working-class voters grew out of workshopping sessions across the Republican Party, aides and GOP operatives said. Administration officials and lawmakers sifted through early polling as they tried to plot a path toward keeping control of Congress next November.
While Republicans across the country are expected to tailor their electoral messages to their specific constituencies — touting immigration or agriculture provisions that may have outsized impact in some districts, for example — Trump allies have seized on taxes as the issue with the broadest appeal.
That focus also carries a secondary benefit: Some of the tax provisions kick in immediately, meaning voters may feel the financial impact early next year, far enough before the midterms for it to potentially influence their vote.
“That’s going to be a good shot of adrenaline,” said LeVell. “So why not get that message out there in some of the key battleground states?”
In a statement, White House spokeswoman Abigail Jackson said the administration had long championed the tax cuts and that they were one of several major elements that officials planned to promote in the coming months.
“Of course the Administration will continue highlighting this win, as we always have,” she said. “Luckily, there are no shortage of wins for the American people in the One Big Beautiful Bill, from modernizing our air traffic control systems to providing funding to secure our Southern Border.”
Still, Republicans will need that messaging to take hold quickly if they hope to dig out of the sizable polling deficit that they face on their domestic agenda law. One recent Pew Research Center survey showed just 32% of Americans approve of the law — and only a quarter believed it would have a mostly positive impact on their families.
Perhaps more alarmingly, just six in 10 Republicans said they approved of the law, even as GOP voters have remained unflinchingly behind Trump and his presidency.
Democratic lawmakers and strategists have cast the massive law as a political gift, pointing to the sagging polls and voters’ persistent worries about its sweeping health care cuts and projections that it will further add to the deficit. Ossoff on Wednesday called Vance’s visit a “damage control mission,” telling reporters that “defunding hospitals and nursing homes to cut taxes for the wealthiest people in the country is not popular here in Georgia.”
As for the “working families” tax rhetoric, Democrats argued that most of the tax relief will benefit the wealthiest Americans — and questioned whether provisions like “no tax on tips” that only affect a tiny slice of workers will resonate with a broader electorate that could face rising costs for health care, electricity and other necessities. Additionally, many middle-class households will only see a continued tax cut rather than an increase — not exactly a boon for GOP messaging.
“Take no tax on tips, no tax on overtime and no tax on car loans, and they make up about 3% of all the tax cuts in the entire bill,” said Brendan Duke, the senior director for federal fiscal policy at the left-leaning Center on Budget and Policy Priorities. “It’s just hard for me to believe that millions of Americans are going to feel warm and vote based on those provisions if they don’t get a dollar from them.”
Georgia could serve as a pivotal proving ground for the White House’s messaging offensive, with Ossoff’s Senate seat emerging as a top target for Republicans trying to secure control of the chamber through 2028. The first-term senator narrowly won in a runoff in 2021 and is viewed as one of the most vulnerable Democrats next year.
But the GOP missed out on its preferred candidate after Gov. Brian Kemp decided against a bid, leading to a three-way primary that has already stoked tensions within the state party and Trump’s broader orbit. Reps. Mike Collins and Buddy Carter, staunch Trump allies who both voted for the domestic policy bill, are vying for the Republican nomination alongside Derek Dooley, a former football coach closely aligned with Kemp.
Dooley’s sudden entrance into the race angered many Trump allies who had sought to quickly consolidate support behind Collins and shift the focus to the general election, said one GOP operative familiar with the dynamics who was granted anonymity to describe private discussions. And it’s concerned others in the state who are still hoping to avoid a proxy battle between Trump and Kemp — the governor who rebuffed Trump’s efforts in 2020 to overturn Georgia’s election result.
Instead, Republicans are now bracing for a drawn-out primary contest that grants Ossoff and Democrats more time to try to tie Trump to the least popular parts of his signature legislation. And if the White House and its allies can’t mount a counteroffensive effective enough to beat Ossoff, they worry it could end up spelling trouble across the midterm map.
“Republicans who think he’s going to be easy to beat in a midterm, with our party in the White House, are crazy,” the GOP operative said, adding that the path gets even more difficult if Americans don’t feel better off financially. “You can’t go tell Americans everything’s great if they can’t afford their bills.”
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