President Trump said “he wasn’t currently looking at any form of tax cuts, a reversal from a day earlier when he floated possible moves to bolster economic growth,” the Wall Street Journal reports.

Said Trump: “I’m not looking at a tax cut now. We don’t need it. We have a strong economy.”

The CBO says federal deficits are projected to grow much more than expected over the next decade thanks to the two-year budget agreement lawmakers and the White House struck last month, the Wall Street Journal reports.

“The agency increased its forecasts for deficits over the next decade by $809 billion, to $12.2 trillion… The increase primarily reflects higher federal spending under the new budget deal, partly offset by lower projected interest rates.”

New York Times: “Rising deficit projections are the result of sluggish growth in federal revenue after Mr. Trump’s 2017 tax cuts went into effect, and several bipartisan agreements to raise military and nondefense domestic discretionary spending, which Mr. Trump signed into law.”

“President Trump on Tuesday confirmed that he is considering a temporary payroll tax cut amid mounting concerns about an economic slowdown,” the Washington Post reports.

“The White House had previously disputed that a payroll tax was under consideration.”

“Senate Republicans are looking to pay for President Trump’s border wall in part by putting about $5 billion less in the largest domestic spending bill,” Roll Call reports.

“That move signals a likely fight over wall funding, as well as over Trump’s ability to reprogram or transfer funds to the border, when the fiscal 2020 appropriations process resumes after Congress returns in September.”

“The Senate voted 67-28 to pass a $2.7 trillion budget deal Thursday that would suspend the debt ceiling through 2021, sending the package to President Trump’s desk after the House passed it last week,” Axios reports.

“The Congressional Budget Office projected that the national debt would reach ‘unprecedented levels’ in the next 30 years should laws remain the same. It exceeded $22 trillion in February, and the federal deficit has grown 23% this fiscal year.”

“Senate Republican leaders and President Trump are working to whip up support for their bipartisan, $2.7 trillion budget deal, hoping to stave off embarrassing defections ahead of a vote that’s splitting the party,” Politico reports.

“Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell and Majority Whip John Thune are trying to persuade undecided rank-and-file senators to avoid a replay of last week’s debacle in the House, when roughly two-thirds of House Republicans opposed the deal… Trump is ‘strategically’ making calls to on-the-fence members.”

Jonathan Swan: “Before President Trump agreed to support a 2-year budget deal that would inflate the national debt and allow $320 billion in new spending, he monitored Fox News for signs of rebellion. But instead of bringing up fiscal responsibility and the national debt, all his favorite hosts were talking about Robert Mueller.”

“Trump liked what he saw (or rather, what he didn’t see), according to two administration officials familiar with the president’s thinking.”

Jonathan Bernstein: “One is that it’s no coincidence that extended government shutdowns have happened in 1995-1996, 2013, and 2018-2019. They all began with Republican majorities in the House. So did the debt-limit brinkmanship of 2011. Although Democrats bargained hard for spending they wanted in this deal, they never really threatened to disrupt the government or the economy over it. Perhaps they’re more responsible than Republicans. But Democratic majorities have also always had substantive goals that they were out to achieve in these negotiations.”

“Republicans? Not so much. They’re after confrontation for its own sake.”

“The House passed a sweeping two-year budget deal Thursday that increases spending for military and domestic programs and suspends the debt ceiling through mid-2021, sending the White House-backed legislation to the Senate,” the Washington Post reports.

“A large majority of Democrats voted for the legislation, while a majority of Republicans opposed it despite appeals from President Trump to support the bill.”

“The 284-149 vote was one of the last acts by the House before lawmakers leave Washington for a six-week summer recess. The Senate is expected to act on the bill next week and sent it to Trump for his signature before senators, too, abandon the Capitol for the summer.”

Politico: “Top Republicans believe only a fraction of their conference will support the legislation, hammered out during weeks of negotiations between Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin. GOP insiders estimate that as little as one-third of the 197-member GOP conference will back the measure, although the vote tally is still fluid.”

“In 2011, with the nation still climbing back from the Great Recession, Republicans threatened global markets by refusing to raise the federal debt limit unless President Barack Obama and the Democrats agreed to steep across-the-board spending cuts for years to come,” the Washington Post reports.

“Eight years later — and $7.7 trillion more in debt — President Trump and GOP lawmakers have agreed this week to lift the debt ceiling again without a fuss, and with hundreds of billions in new spending on top of it.”

“The deal marks a significant capitulation to Trump after years of brinkmanship from Republicans claiming the mantle of fiscal responsibility, underscoring the president’s far-reaching hold over his party and a disregard for the budget-cutting and debt reduction that conservatives long claimed as priorities.”

“The House Freedom Caucus took an official position Tuesday not to back President Trump’s spending deal and agreement to lift the debt ceiling, citing concerns with its impact on the national debt,” The Hill reports.

Politico: “The band of roughly 30 hard-liners, which includes some of President Donald Trump’s top allies on Capitol Hill, cited fiscal concerns in a statement opposing the agreement. The deal would lift stiff budget caps and raise the debt ceiling for two years, raising federal spending by a total of $320 billion without being fully offset.”

James Holman: “Mitch McConnell told President Trump privately last month that no politician has ever lost an election for spending more money. That mind-set – caring more about the next election than the next generation – helps explain why the Senate majority leader and the president endorsed a budget deal last night, which still needs to pass Congress, that will raise spending limits by $320 billion while suspending the federal debt ceiling until after both men’s 2020 reelection fights.”

“It also illustrates how hollow so much of the rhetoric from McConnell, Trump and other Republicans was during Barack Obama’s presidency.”

New York Times: “In the first Obama term, which included a large government stimulus package to jump-start job creation in the depths of the recession, discretionary spending on military and domestic items rose by about 3 percent per year, on average. In his second term, such spending declined by an annual average of nearly 2 percent.”

“Mr. Trump is currently on pace to increase discretionary spending by an average of nearly 4 percent per year.”

Playbook: “Capitol Hill has reached a budget deal. We say it like that because we do not yet have definitive evidence that President Trump is supporting this agreement. He tweeted that he was ‘pleased to announce that a deal has been struck’ and said it was a ‘real compromise in order to give another big victory to our Great Military and Vets!'”

“But the tweets from Trump did not explicitly say he supported it — and in this era of governing, that matters, because one person speaks for the president, and that’s him. (You might notice that press releases from folks like House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy did not say they would support the bill — a nod to the fact that Trump could change his mind.) The leadership in both parties had expected a more forceful endorsement from Trump, several sources told us.”

“We asked the White House for clarification Monday — was the president in favor of this bill? They didn’t answer, but many others in the White House conceded to us that, indeed, the president needed to see how this all played in the public sphere.”

Politico: “With a new bipartisan budget deal that does nothing to cut federal spending, Trump is on track for another $1 trillion deficit this year. And there’s no reason to believe the following fiscal year will be any different, with ballooning deficits from higher spending, the 2017 tax cuts — Trump’s signature legislative achievement, which slashed revenue — and none of the entitlement reforms long preached by Republican leaders on Capitol Hill.”

“Candidate Trump bragged that he would pay off the entire federal debt in eight years, but President Trump is governing as if deficits don’t matter.”