User:Atcovi/AP Government/Government1222021

Prompt
In the 2016 elections, the Republican presidential candidate and the Republican candidates for the House and Senate campaigned on an economic platform of lowering taxes for businesses and individuals. It resulted in the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act of 2017, which constituted the largest one-time tax decrease in American history.

The law lowered the rate for individuals in the highest tax bracket from 39.6 percent to 37 percent. It decreased the top business tax rate from 36 percent to 21 percent. The Republicans argued that tax breaks would stimulate economic growth and lead to more innovation from the private sector. Most Democratic members of Congress were critical of the legislation, labeling it a tax break for corporations and the wealthy.

Nonetheless, Republicans controlled a majority of both chambers of Congress, and each chamber voted its own version of the bill. The bill passed in the House of Representatives on November 16 with 227 Republicans voting in favor and 13 opposing it. A slightly different version of the bill passed the Senate on December 2 with 51 Republican senators voting in favor of the bill. Every Democratic legislator in both chambers voted against the bill.

After reading the scenario, please respond to A, B, and C below.
 * Referencing the scenario, describe the party control of government in the scenario and explain how that party control could have affected the process by which the bill became a law.
 * Using the trustee model of representation explain why a Republican in the House of Representatives might have cast a vote against this bill.
 * Describe a way that Democrats, even though they were in the minority, might have tried to impede the passage of this bill.

Answer
A. The party control describes in this scenario is majority Republican. The Republican party was the party that initiated the campaign of lowering taxes for businesses and individuals and since the Republicans controlled both the Senate and the House of Representatives, it is most likely that a Republican-backed bill will turn into a law as majority of the houses will support the bill. B. A Republican in the House of Representatives may oppose the conversion of the bill into a law because they may live in a poorer area of than the other Republicans voting on this bill, which may lead to them agreeing with the Democrat's view of the bill being a "tax-break" for the wealthy as their poorer population may side with that idea. Since the elected representative is seen as a "trustee" for their electoral district, they will represent the view of their district and thereby oppose the bill. (Trustee model of representation) C. The Democrats may oppose the bill by imposing a filibuster, a governmental procedure only in the Senate where congress members led a debate regarding the bill in order to delay the signing of the bill (taking the bill to "death"). The senators who abide by the Democratic party may hold an unlimited debate in the hopes of prolonging the singing of the bill. A cloture may be imposed by the opposite party, but it is difficult to get a 2/3 majority vote after an elongated debate.