Fox News star Stuart Varney is amplifying a Fox Business interview with The Wall Street Journal‘s conservative journalist Kim Strassel, columnist of the weekly “Potomac Watch,” and member of the WSJ editorial board.
As seen in the clip below, Strassel addressed the report of anonymous White House staffers pushing to undercut President Trump’s tax reforms with a “Millionaire’s Tax.” (The title of her April 18 column is ‘Whispers of a Millionaire’s Tax.’)
Strassel said: “Yeah, I think this is really an unfortunate campaign because it’s undermining the President. We have seen this string of anonymous stories in the press lately suggesting that Donald Trump is open to higher marginal tax rates, income tax rates, corporate tax rates. Of course, he’s not said that publicly.”
“This is largely backfiring.” @KimStrassel on anonymous staffers pushing to undercut President Trump’s tax reforms with a “Millionaires Tax.” pic.twitter.com/MiX1iFXvF6
— Varney & Co. (@Varneyco) April 21, 2025
Strassel added: “This is a group of people that seem to want — their more populist wing — they like the idea of the class warfare standards that Democrats have, maybe they’re running scared from it. Rather than fighting their corner publicly though, they’re putting this out there, trying to suggest that the President is open and develop a constituency to then go back and argue for this with him, and instead of just having a public fight about this. It’s largely backfiring though.”
Note: Axios reported in March that “Some in the White House…were considering allowing the 37 percent rate for the top tax bracket—set in place in the 2017 Trump tax law—to expire, returning it to 39.6 percent,” which — it was proposed — would allow Trump to live up to certain of his 2024 campaign promises such as the elimination of taxes on tips, overtime and social security benefits.
However, as one White House official told Axios,“If we renew tax cuts for the rich paid for by throwing people off Medicaid, we’re gonna get [expletive] slaughtered.”
Former Trump White House advisor Steve Bannon responded to the idea by issuing a warning against extending tax cuts for the wealthy.
Bannon wrote: “No Tax on Tips , No Tax on Overtime, No Tax on Social Security—without Massive Spending Cuts or Dramatic Growth the Math DICTATES that you CANNOT Extend the Tax Cuts to the Upper Bracket without Driving an Even Bigger Deficit…”
But raising taxes on wealthy Americans isn’t something most Republicans even talk about. House Majority Leader Steve Scalise (R-LA) also responded to the idea of raising taxes on the rich by saying “No. No. No.”
And here’s @SteveScalise: “No. No. No.” https://t.co/yjCgfXKiwN
— Jake Sherman (@JakeSherman) April 1, 2025
Note: During Trump’s first term as POTUS, he had repeatedly praised and shared Strassel’s commentary in the WSJ and suggested that she deserves a Pulitzer Prize (see below). After Joe Biden won the 2020 presidential election Strassel claimed, as Trump obviously did, that the election contained voting irregularities.
Kimberley Strassel should get the Pulitzer. She is a treasure (and I don’t know her) who correctly called the Russia Hoax right from the start! Others who were soooo wrong will get the Prize. Fake News! https://t.co/TJJPY5MM6X
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) April 19, 2019
