A bill co-sponsored by three Nassau Republicans to expand state and local tax deductions known as SALT failed to make it to the House floor Wednesday.
The Republican-controlled House of Representatives voted 225-195 against a rule change that would have allowed the bill to go before the House for a vote.
The bill was co-sponsored by Reps. Anthony D’Esposito (R-Island Park), Andrew Garbarino (R-Bayport) and Nick LaLota (R-Amityville).
The bill would allow tax-paying married couples making less than $500,000 per year to reduce their federally taxed income by as much as $20,000, as opposed to the current $10,000 cap.
The cap has produced bigger tax bills for residents of high-tax states such as New York, New Jersey and California.
D’Esposito said in a statement he was “frustrated” that the legislation failed to make it to the House and blamed “New York Democrats … hell-bent on scoring political points.”
This bill was just the latest attempt to raise the SALT cap put in place during Donald Trump’s presidency. The tax plan, signed into law in 2017, lowered the corporate tax rate and raised tax deductions for businesses, but it also set a $10,000 cap for SALT deductions.
In 2022, Nassau Rep. Tom Suozzi, along with other representatives, threatened to block Biden’s Build Back Better bill if the legislation did not include expanded SALT deductions.
“We support the president’s agenda, and if there are any efforts that include a change in the tax code, then a SALT fix must be part of it. No SALT, no deal,” Suozzi said in a joint statement with New Jersey Representatives Mikie Sherrill and Josh Gottheimer in January 2022.
SALT deductions are an especially important topic in New York’s 3rd Congressional District since Nassau County is in a high-tax state and is the ninth wealthiest county in the United States, according to U.S. News & World Report as of December 2023.
As a result, SALT deductions were a focal talking point for Suozzi and Legislator Mazi Melesa Pilip during their contentious special election run to replace disgraced former Representative George Santos.
Both Suozzi, who retired from Congress in 2022 to run unsuccessfully for governor, and Pilip publicly supported reinstating SALT deductions.
“My priority is to get the state and local tax reduction back,” Suozzi told PIX 11 in a special on Jan. 30. He blamed Republicans for not passing SALT through the House. Suozzi boasted about passing a fix on SALT three times while he was in Congress, though he acknowledged that the proposed deductions did not make it through the Senate.
“One thing I didn’t agree with [Trump on]: He took away the SALT deduction from New Yorkers,” Pilip told PIX11. “It was helping a lot of families and they deserve that.”
Pilip claimed that Suozzi was not able to maintain SALT deductions during his time in Congress.
The current SALT cap is set to expire in 2025. The question remains whether Suozzi and his fellow representatives will be able to make progress on SALT deductions by 2025.
Suozzi, who defeated Pilip and is headed back to the House, declined to comment.
