President Donald Trump applauded the passage of the GOP tax bill in the Senate.

The president said that the final version of the bill could cut the corporate rate to 22% instead of 20%.

Trump long promised to cut the corporate rate to 15%. After that did not make it into the bill, he said the 20% rate was his "red line."



President Donald Trump backed off a "red line" for the GOP tax bill on Saturday as the plan heads into a home stretch.

Trump told reporters that the final version of the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act (TCJA) that will come out of a conference committee between House and Senate members could have a higher corporate tax rate than the current bills.

"Business tax all the way down from 35% to 20%," Trump said outside the White House before a trip to New York. "It could be 22% when it comes out but it could also be 20%. We’ll see what ultimately comes out."

Trump previously described the 20% corporate rate as his red line. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin said the rate was "not negotiable."

That rate was included in the Republican tax plans despite Trump's campaign pledge to bring the rate down to 15% from the current 35%. But plunging the corporate rate so heavily complicates the math for Republicans in a tight budget window.

After passage of the TCJA in the Senate overnight Saturday, the bill is headed to a conference committee since the House version contains differences. In the committee, members likely from the two tax-writing committees — Ways and Means in the House and Finance in the Senate — will try and work out a bill that could pass both chambers.

To do that, Republicans may need to make concessions to make the bill more generous to families — or to certain interest groups. Easing up on the corporate rate cut could help generate revenue to fit those priorities into the bill.

GOP senators already considered cutting the corporate rate to 21% or 22% to squeeze in a variety of other benefits, but ultimately did not.