Many congressional Republicans say they are willing to expand the child tax credit — if they can figure out how to pay for it.
At least one lawmaker already has an idea of what that expansion might look like under full Republican control of Washington. Sen. Josh Hawley is pushing to include a provision in a reconciliation bill that would make parents eligible to receive up to $5,000 per year per child — more than doubling the credit’s current $2,000 maximum — while still keeping some work requirements for eligibility.
But even with such a high-profile conservative backing the policy, Hawley acknowledged that it would not be an easy sell to every fiscal conservative, many of whom want to see how the provision would be paid for.
Hawley said he thinks his party is applying that scrutiny unevenly.
“I noticed that many of my Republican colleagues don’t wanna offset tax cuts generally. But strangely, when it comes to the child tax credit, I hear a lot of talk about, ‘Well, that has to be offset,’” Hawley said. “I’m not going to vote for a whole bunch of tax cuts for corporations if there’s nothing in there for families. That’s gonna be a problem.”
House Republicans told NOTUS that they are primarily concerned about exactly that — how a reconciliation bill would make up the tax revenue lost from proposals like Hawley’s.
“We want tax policy that’s pro-family, pro-worker, pro-economic growth, but the whole context of the legislation package has to actually reduce deficits. Not bullcrap, made-up, pie-in-the-sky growth numbers to achieve balance,” said Rep. Chip Roy, who’s known for splitting from his party over spending issues.
Another House Freedom Caucus member told NOTUS he shared the same hesitation about a child tax credit expansion.
“It’s about the math, making it work. Anything we can do to help working families is a good thing, but we also have to have a 10-year runway to getting better in line, balanced with our budget, so the question is, how do you offset it?” Rep. Andy Ogles said.
Previous attempts to raise the child tax credit caused clashes between Republicans who say their party should make efforts to support working-class voters who increasingly show up for them at the polls and Republicans who want to rein in government spending. But since President-elect Donald Trump’s campaign told Semafor it was considering “a significant expansion” in August, proposals like Hawley’s may stand a better chance.
Hawley’s is one of many proposed tax credits that Congress has to consider during this year’s reconciliation process.
“I’m looking at the whole tax conversation and all the related proposals holistically,” Sen. Todd Young told NOTUS. “I know there are a lot of child tax credit proposals out there. I’ll have to see which ones are boxed.”
The Trump transition team did not respond to a request for comment. But already, some of his major allies on Capitol Hill have made clear they’re open to expanding the credit.
Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, who will chair the House’s DOGE subcommittee, said she’s “a huge supporter. I’m a mom with three kids, so I think it’s good.”
And similarly, Rep. Nancy Mace, who campaigned as a “fiscal hawk” last year, told NOTUS she’s “for sure” on board.
Last year, Senate Republicans blocked an attempt to incrementally expand the credit, which passed the House 357-70 months earlier. Hawley was one of only three Senate Republicans to support the bill. GOP senators said at the time they were concerned about how the provision was financed and that it wasn’t tied to work requirements.
Rep. Aaron Bean, a co-chairman and co-founder of the congressional DOGE caucus, told NOTUS he supports proposals to give tax relief to families, but echoed some of his colleagues’ concerns about the cost.
“I dig it. We need help for parents, but we also have to pay for it, so we can’t just give things away without paying for it. So where are we going to cut to help pay for that child tax credit and other goodies that we want to give?” Bean said, adding that cutting broadband internet infrastructure funding and electric vehicle subsidies could potentially offset Hawley’s proposal.
The reluctance signals Hawley will have to push his colleagues to embrace what he calls a “pro-family, pro-worker” policy. He says Trump won with working families’ support, and his party owes them this “big tax cut.”
During Trump’s first administration, the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act expanded the credit to up to $2,000 per child per year, but it will be cut in half in 2026 without congressional action. (Trump campaigned on making the expanded credit permanent last year.)
In 2021, Congress temporarily expanded the credit’s maximum to $3,000 (or $3,600 for children under 5) through the American Rescue Plan Act, which also allowed families with no income to receive the credit and made half of it available through monthly checks.
The expansion led to a 46% decline in the child poverty rate, and child poverty more than doubled the following year when it expired. But what made it so effective at reducing poverty was that it was made fully refundable, meaning low-income families could receive the full credit, even if they didn’t pay taxes. The Center on Budget and Policy Priorities estimated that the full refundability of the credit was responsible for 87% of its impact on poverty.
Hawley’s proposal would make the credit available through monthly checks and would do away with income minimums, but filers would still need to be employed and pay taxes to earn it — an aspect he relies on while marketing the credit to his colleagues, insisting his proposal isn’t welfare or social assistance.
Republicans like Vice President-elect JD Vance were quick to latch on to expanding the credit as a popular proposal, though he didn’t offer any suggestions for eligibility requirements or refundability. As a vice presidential candidate, Vance proposed raising it to $5,000 per child per year, which Bloomberg reported could add $2 trillion to $3 trillion to the deficit over the next decade.
It’s the kind of price tag that worries Republicans like Rep. Jim Jordan, who told NOTUS that his support “depends on the context of the whole tax package.”
Republicans largely said they thought the policy could help working-class families — though some added the caveat that there’s still a long way to go negotiating any of the proposed tax credits into this year’s reconciliation bill.
“I think it’s a pro-family policy that I’ve long supported,” Sen. Eric Schmitt told NOTUS. “We’ll see how it all plays out as we kind of get into the meat grinder here.”
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Emily Kennard is a NOTUS reporter and an Allbritton Journalism Institute fellow.