White House Denies Calculating VAT Revenues

Meredith Jessup | April 19, 2010 1:44 PM

Fox News' Major Garrett reports that White House officials today are denying reports--including one today from the New York Times--that they've been calculating the amount of revenue they could raise from a value-added tax (VAT). White House spokesman Matthew Vogel responded:

"The President has not proposed this idea nor is it under consideration... The President is not proposing to cut the deficit at the expense of middle class families."

Paul Volcker who sits on the President's Economic Recovery Advisory Board said last September he thought a VAT or a carbon-based tax might be necessary to address mounting federal debt. But another White House official told Fox, "The Obama Administration has not done VAT calculations."

This reminds me a lot of when Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid told the bipartisan health care summit, "No one has talked about reconciliation..."