A new upstart think tank founded by a former Trump official is looking to work behind the scenes to educate lawmakers and staff about how to right the country’s fiscal ship.
The Economic Policy Innovation Center, or EPIC, had its soft launch last month and is planning to ramp up to a hard launch in September. The right-of-center group, helmed by president and CEO Paul Winfree, has two other employees with backgrounds in economic policy but is hoping to expand over the coming six months.
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Winfree served in the Trump administration as deputy assistant to the president for domestic policy, the deputy director of the Domestic Policy Council, and the director of budget policy and formed the think tank after his work at the Heritage Foundation. Winfree told the Washington Examiner during a recent interview that the group is going to be doing a lot of hiring over the next few months as it hopes to make a name for itself on Capitol Hill and at the national level.
Winfree said something that separates EPIC from others in the policy space is a focus on more long-term economic questions and how to solve them, particularly by focusing on more behind-the-scenes work on Capitol Hill rather than splashy public outreach campaigns.
EPIC isn’t looking to be another group focused on the biggest issue of the day but rather sees itself helping to prepare for and educate on major policy battles coming down the pipeline, he explained.
“What we’re going to be working on and thinking about is more longer-term issues. Where do we want to go?” Winfree said. “Looking out into the future, and ultimately, how do we get there, and then how do we build the coalitions and policy movement to be where we want to be out in five, 10, 15, 20, 25 years.”
For instance, one thing that EPIC is already dialed in on, and will work closely with policymakers to prepare for, is the enormous fiscal cliff that Congress and the White House will face in 2025, shortly after the next election cycle.
At the center of the fiscal cliff are expiring tax provisions within the 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, more commonly referred to as the “Trump tax cuts” or “Republican tax cuts.” Additionally, this year’s contentious debt limit deal’s expiration lines up with the 2025 expiration of the slew of tax provisions, including the doubled estate tax and the $10,000 cap on deductions for state and local taxes paid.
“When you look at all of those things together, ultimately it creates a fiscal cliff-like situation that isn’t all that dissimilar from the 2012 [and] 2013 fiscal cliff with the expiration of the Bush tax cuts except for size and scope,” Winfree said. “So there is the potential for it to be much, much larger than basically what Congress and the White House had to come together on in 2012 and 2013.”
He said that if nothing happens between now and then with regard to policymakers planning on how to use that opportunity to enact a pro-growth agenda, then Congress and the White House are likely merely to kick the can down the road once.
“Ultimately, you have a series of fiscal events that are on the horizon that all are meaningful for the fiscal trajectory of this country but also create opportunities for economic policy reforms that are larger than the scale of those cliffs themselves,” Winfree said of his group’s plans for the lead-up to 2025.
Winfree, a Ph.D., framed his academic background as a bit unique — that of an “economic historian.” He clarified that he is not a historian of economic thought but rather someone who is an economist and applies the techniques both in theory and empirics to questions in history.
“So, say, understanding what led to American economic development or how we got into the Great Depression and ultimately got out of the Great Depression. Big questions like that,” he said, adding, with that in mind, he tends to take a longer-term approach to policy.
Winfree said his group intends to follow a fairly straightforward sequence that he finds is the best way to make policy. The first is educating policymakers about the matters at stake and what is coming down the line, the second is getting the policy itself right, and then the politics come into play. He said if the education, policy, and politics sequence is hit correctly, then a policy agenda can become a success.
He said at the outset of EPIC’s formation, there would be a tremendous amount of work that the group will do on educating lawmakers and policy staff on Capitol Hill about what good economic policy looks like or how to use the budget process most effectively.
Joining Winfree at EPIC is Brittany Madni, the executive vice president of the group. Madni brings experience on Capitol Hill, where she previously served as the deputy chief of staff and legislative director for Rep. Ashley Hinson (R-IA), as well as holding roles with other GOP offices.
A recent addition to the team is William Beach, who completed a four-year term as the commissioner for the Bureau of Labor Statistics. He is serving as EPIC’s senior fellow in economics and also comes from an economic policy background.
As EPIC works to build its team over the next year, it is looking to recruit employees with academic backgrounds in economics, as well as with work in the policymaking space, Winfree said.
Looking to 2024, Winfree said EPIC has already been in touch with the Republican presidential campaigns and noted that the group has closer relations with some campaigns than others, although he didn’t specify which ones.
“But we’re talking to everybody, and I found everybody to be very receptive,” he said.
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In terms of finances, EPIC has received seed funding from a group of people and organizations, a handful of which are foundations, according to Winfree, who said he is in talks with a lot of people who are free-market advocates and in the right-of-center policy space.
“And I’m getting a lot of good feedback from the donor community in general and a lot of excitement,” he said. “So I see lots of opportunities over the next year and actually next few years to ultimately build EPIC up beyond our plan to ramp up within the next six months to a year.”
