The District of Columbia can reject President Trump’s tax cut because Congress missed the deadline for disapproving the law, D.C. Attorney General Brian Schwalb said Tuesday.
Congress voted earlier this month to strike down the city’s tax law, which was voted on by the district’s council in November to decouple the city from the president’s One Big Beautiful Bill, which includes tax deductions such as no tax on tips, overtime wages or personal auto loan interest. Federal tax returns would not be affected by the D.C. law.
But Mr. Schwalb said in a letter that it came too late to affect taxpayer filings in 2025, given that the tax season has already begun.
The Democrat argues that Congress missed a 30-day deadline and failed to make the resolution apply retroactively, so the disapproval does not affect D.C.’s tax laws.
At the end of the 30-day period, only the House of Representatives had passed the disapproval.
Such disapproval resolutions can make a D.C. law null and void, but “in our view, Congress did not do so here,” Mr. Schwalb said, adding that the disapproval “operates as an expression of Congress’ unfavorable opinion of the Temporary Conformity Act but not as a repeal.”
The opinion from the city’s top legal officer could foreshadow headbutting between Congress and Washington over the rare congressional move; only five disapproval resolutions have been passed by Congress.
Congress retains full authority over the city and its laws under the Constitution, but through the Home Rule Act of 1973, lawmakers on Capitol Hill gifted the city’s local government with certain powers.
Congress has 30 legislative days to review and overturn D.C. legislation before it becomes law. But Mr. Trump signed the disapproval measure about a week after the deadline.
“As a result, the disapproval resolution did not prevent the Temporary Conformity Act from taking effect, nor did the subsequent signature of the President cause the disapproval resolution to be ‘deemed’ a repeal of the Temporary Conformity Act within the meaning of the Home Rule,” Mr. Schwalb wrote to the city’s chief financial officer, Glen Lee.
