President Donald Trump and the Republican Party’s top priority heading into next year’s midterm congressional elections will be selling the tax cuts in the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, a pitch that met a stiff headwind from the media and the Democratic Party.

While the legislation eked through the House and Senate and was signed into law by Trump on Independence Day, White House insiders said that they realize they have to do a better job selling the tax cuts bill if they hope to keep control of Congress.

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During the debate, Democrats and the media played up the spending cuts in the bill as purposefully painful, portraying the tax cuts as benefiting the wealthy, even though they included the elimination of taxes on tips, an increase in the standard deduction, and a bonus to mid- to lower-income retirees.

New GOP polling shared with Secrets showed that voters were evenly split on whether the bill was a tax-cutting or spending legislation. In the survey from McLaughlin & Associates, 39% said it was “more of a tax cut,” and 39% called it “more of a spending bill.”

In addition, support was split. McLaughlin said 44% supported the bill while 42% didn’t.

“President Trump’s pro-growth tax cuts passed and that’s what counts, but we know work has to be done,” said pollster John McLaughlin, who has polled for Trump.

The White House and Treasury Department have already begun to push back on the negative spin from the Democrats and media, building a case that in opposing the legislation, liberals favored massive increases on working-class voters.

A key element in the bill was extending the Trump tax cuts made in his first administration. They were set to expire but will continue now that the bill passed.

McLaughlin’s poll provided powerful evidence that the argument should help Trump and his party in the midterm elections. Asked if they were told that taxes would have increased if the Democrats got their way and killed the bill, 45% said they would be less likely to vote for Democrats next year, versus 23% who said they would.

“The left-of-center legacy media misled and provided misinformation on Trump tax cuts. They tried to define it as a spending bill, not tax cuts,” said McLaughlin.

He also told Secrets, “The big challenge for us to overcome heading into the midterms is to prove legacy media misinformation wrong. As the economy grows, Republicans need to do that against Democrats who supported the biggest tax increase in history and recession.”