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Vice President Kamala Harris blindsided Democrats and progressive activists after she endorsed a proposal first pushed by former President Donald Trump to exempt tips for service and hospitality workers from taxes.

“Harris’s support for the idea is being seen as an aggressive play for votes in Nevada, a critical swing state where service workers will be key, and as an effort to neutralize whatever advantage Trump may have gained by first floating the idea during meetings with GOP lawmakers on Capitol Hill in June,” The Hill reported.

“But key Democratic lawmakers and progressive activists have raised serious concerns about the substance of the proposal to shield tipped income from taxation, worrying it would leave out many lower- and middle-income workers who are just as deserving of tax relief but don’t work for tips. Policy experts also question how such a proposal could be drafted without having major impacts on economic behavior, potentially costing the federal government much more than the $100 billion to $200 billion it is currently projected to add to the national debt over the next 10 years,” the outlet added.

“It’s not something I saw coming,” one senior Senate Democratic aide said. “I did not expect her to go on the tipped-wage thing. I did not see it as a serious proposal from Trump, and it doesn’t become a serious proposal now.”

When Trump first brought up the idea with GOP members in June, senior Democrats on the Senate Finance Committee and the House Ways and Means Committee, which are in charge of the tax code, spoke out against it.

Trump told the senators that the idea came from a waitress he met.

Senate Finance Committee Chair Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) called Trump’s plan to get rid of taxes on tips a “bogus proposal.” He also said that other Trump policies, like tariffs, which would raise the prices of goods, would cancel out Trump’s plan.

In June, Sen. Debbie Stabenow (Mich.), who is part of the Senate Finance Committee and the Democratic leadership, said she didn’t believe Trump’s plan was serious and didn’t think it would help low-wage workers enough.

The top Democratic staffer in the Senate said that the idea hadn’t been seriously talked about in the Senate before Trump brought it up in June.

Steven Rosenthal, a senior fellow at the Tax Policy Center, which is a partnership between the Urban Institute and the Brookings Institution, said it would be hard to write laws that would keep tip income from being taxed in a way that would stop people from trying to take advantage of it.

“I don’t know how I would draft it to exclude my plumber or my maid. Are those service workers? If they are employees … will the employer ask for the employees to be compensated more by tips going forward?” he asked. “We already have too many people asking for tips. … What are we going to see? A grocery teller asking for tips? Plumbers? Where would you draw that line?”

The two Democratic senators from Nevada also support the plan to stop taxing money that comes in from tips.

It’s hard for Sen. Jacky Rosen (D-Nev.) to stay in office, but she and Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto (D-Nev.) said last month that they would back the No Tax on Tips Act.

The plan is also backed by Nevada’s powerful Culinary Union, which is the state’s largest group of working women.

Ted Pappageorge, secretary-treasurer of the Culinary Union, said that keeping tips out of taxes would “help people who work in hospitality.”

Karine Jean-Pierre, the press secretary for the White House, said on Monday that Biden would “absolutely” sign a bill to get rid of taxes on tips if it got to his desk.

But Harris’s surprise support for one of Trump’s most famous tax ideas has made many Democrats and progressive campaigners even less sure of where she stands on important economic issues.

Democrats have thought for weeks that Harris would mostly follow Biden’s tax and economic plans, but her campaign hasn’t released much information about her ideas, so many of her political friends don’t know where she stands on important issues if she is elected president.

Bob Borosage, co-director of Campaign for America’s Future, said that Harris’s sudden support for Trump’s idea took progressives by surprise.

“Most people thought it was a silly idea when Trump did it. I think she just endorsed it to take it off the table. I don’t think it’s a serious thing,” Borosage said.

Harris suddenly copying Trump’s idea illustrates that Democrats don’t know for sure if she’ll support other Trump-favored tax policies.

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