White House expects US Congress to pass tax deal

White House adviser David Axelrod said on Sunday he expected the US House of Representatives will pass President Barack Obama's tax deal without significant changes. The Senate was expected this week to approve the deal Obama cut with Republicans but many Democrats in the House have complained that the president made too many concessions.
"We believe that when it comes back to the House that we will get a vote and it will prevail there," Axelrod said on CNN's "State of the Union."
Obama's $856 billion tax deal, struck with the Republicans who will soon wield greater clout in Washington, extends all tax cuts passed under the Republican administration of President George W. Bush, even those for wealthier Americans.
Democrats had hoped to allow tax rates to rise for the wealthiest 2 percent of US households to avoid increasing the country's record-high debt level.
House Democrats also are particularly angered that the deal did not toughen taxes on estates of the richest Americans as much as they wanted.
In a caucus last week, they rejected the tax deal and chanted, "Just say no!"
Despite the opposition in Obama's own party, Axelrod said he did not expect significant changes to the tax deal. "We can't change it in major ways and expect that it is going to pass. ... I expect that the framework that was agreed to will be largely what is voted on," he said.
White House economic adviser Austan Goolsbee also predicted the package would pass. "I understand the feeling that it is a bitter pill to swallow, the high-income tax cuts," Goolsbee told NBC's "Meet the Press."
"But what the president was able to get that is substantially bigger than that and important for the economy - whether it's incentives for investment for firms, whether it's a payroll tax cut for 155 million workers is really important and we can't let that go away," he said.
Economists say the package, especially a payroll tax cut for workers, could boost the sluggish economy at a time when Congress has no appetite for stimulus spending. Its cost would exceed even the $814 billion stimulus package passed in 2009 to fight the worst recession since the 1930s.