A slew of House Republicans are set to meet with the president at Mar-a-Lago over the weekend, including GOP members of the SALT Caucus, a bipartisan group dedicated to restoring the state and local tax deduction to cut costs for middle-class families. A $10,000 SALT cap that was implemented by Trump in 2017 is set to expire later this year, and some Republicans want to loosen that cap in the forthcoming reconciliation bill — or else they won’t support it. 

“I’ve been very clear from the start: I will not support a tax bill that does not lift the cap on SALT,” Rep. Mike Lawler (R-NY), who will attend the Saturday meeting at Mar-a-Lago, told reporters on Tuesday. 

A handful of other Republicans echoed those sentiments, with Rep. Nick LaLota (R-NY) telling the Washington Examiner he and several other members of the SALT Caucus have vowed the same. 

“We plan on sticking together throughout this whole issue,” LaLota said. 

The SALT demands are notable given a historically thin GOP House majority to deliver on Trump’s agenda of tax cuts, border security, and energy policies. House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) also plans to include a debt ceiling increase in the bill, a tough sell for fiscal conservatives who want accompanying spending cuts that could turn off centrists.

With the reconciliation bill needing near unanimous support in the House, Trump and Johnson have a tough juggling act ahead of trying to appease various factions of the Republican conference.

Trump’s 2017 tax law capped the amount of state and local taxes, colloquially referred to as SALT, that can be claimed on federal deductions to $10,000 per filer, which was previously unlimited. However, Trump vowed on the campaign trail to “get SALT back,” a promise warmly received by Republicans in high-tax states. 

LaLota, who also plans to attend the Saturday meeting, said he looks forward to “thank[ing Trump] in person for making that commitment and start working with him and his team on details about how to get that into a reconciliation package.”

It’s not clear what a SALT provision in the reconciliation bill would look like, but some Republicans in the House and Senate have been wary about eliminating the cap, arguing it would worsen the national debt and act only as a giveaway for coastal wealthy elites. 

But an agreement must be made, Lawler contended, because if Trump’s tax cuts expire without another law in place, the cap will be eliminated. 

“There’s a simple reality: If we do nothing, the cap on SALT lifts entirely,” Lawler said. “So it’s incumbent on everybody to negotiate in good faith and come up with a number that really is beneficial to taxpayers.”

But as Republicans begin hammering out the details this weekend, some Democrats from high-tax states are demanding to be part of the conversation. 

Fellow New York Rep. Pat Ryan (D-NY) urged Trump to include Democrats in the negotiations at Mar-a-Lago, expressing skepticism the president-elect will work in good faith. 

“I’ll go to Mar-A-Lago myself if that’s what it takes,” Ryan said in a statement. “My fear, to be quite honest, is that Trump is going to put on this charade and then roll over House Republicans, just like he did in 2017. Let’s get everyone to the table now — it’s time to remove the SALT cap once and for all.”