Republican lawmakers are vowing to oppose Democratic Gov. Janet Mills' plan to send $300 rebate checks to many Maine taxpayers and, instead, want the state to adopt recent federal tax changes from President Donald Trump's "One Big Beautiful Bill."
During her final State of the State address last week, Mills proposed dipping into the state's $1 billion reserve fund to send $300 "affordability relief checks" to roughly 725,000 Maine residents. But on Tuesday, Republicans accused Mills of trying to buy votes for her U.S. Senate campaign with the one-time payments.
GOP lawmakers said Maine families need more long-term relief. So they are pushing for the state to adopt at least four of the tax changes recently passed by Congress: exempting tips and overtime from federal income taxes, increasing the standard deduction and adding another tax deduction for taxpayers ages 65 or older.
"Affordability is not a $300 check that will pay for one fancy meal at a restaurant or maybe one electric bill," said Rep. Billy Bob Faulkingham, R-Winter Harbor, the House minority leader. "Affordability is being able to pay rent, it's being able to pay a car mortgage, it's being able to pay your bills, it's being able to buy groceries."
The $300 checks are part of a package of "affordability" measures that will be included in a midyear budget bill that Mills is expected to unveil this week or as separate measures during the short legislative session. Other initiatives include $70 million — also taken from the state's budget stabilization or "rainy day" fund — for housing initiatives and reviving the free community college program. The Democratic-controlled Legislature only funded the tuition-free community college program through last year's class of graduation high school seniors.
Mills proposed spending roughly $200 million of the state's $1 billion rainy day fund to pay for the $300 checks, which would go out to individuals earning $75,000 or less or married couples earning $150,000 or less.
The Mills administration has estimated that adopting — or conforming to — all of the federal tax changes in Trump's "One Big Beautiful Bill" will cost the state $400 million in the current budget. Mills and other Democrats have also strongly criticized other aspects of the bill, such as cuts to Medicaid and extensions of tax breaks that disproportionately benefit the wealthy.
"As you know, Congress passed and the president signed legislation that I will call the 'Big Bad Bill' — a bill that cut billions of dollars in health care funding over the next decade in order to finance tax breaks primarily for billionaires who don’t need them," Mills said during last week's speech to the Legislature. "What a backward policy."
But Republican lawmakers estimate that the four changes they highlighted on Tuesday would cost the state $137 million.
Rep. Jack Ducharme of Madison, a Republican member of the legislature's budget-writing committee, said the "tax conformity" proposals backed by GOP lawmakers will offer ongoing savings to taxpayers. And Ducharme said those costs can be absorbed by the estimated $248 million surplus.
"It's disingenuous to me for our friends from the other side to be talking about affordability when here is a tailor-made thing — all they have to do is say, 'We will conform,' and it's $137 million saved for Maine's taxpayers," Ducharme said.
Mills is expected to propose adopting some federal tax changes as part of a supplemental budget proposal this week. However, the Democratic-controlled Legislature will ultimately decide how to proceed.
