President Donald Trump's deal with Democratic leadership to pass an increase in the debt ceiling and deliver Hurricane Harvey aid to Texas could ultimately help the administration's tax reform agenda, political commentator Michael Reagan said Thursday.
In an interview with "Newmax Now" hosts Bill Tucker and Carol Roth on Newsmax TV, the son of the late President Ronald Reagan said the dealmaking should surprise no one — and conservatives should stop griping about it.
"He went where he needed to go to get the deal done — and that's exactly what he did," Reagan said.
"If you need 60 votes, you're going to need the Democrats, and that's where he went, and I think that ultimately it could be a very good thing for Donald Trump as we go into tax reform and getting taxes done."
Important: Newsmax TV is available on DirecTV Ch. 349, U-Verse 1220, and FiOS 615. If your cable operator does not have Newsmax TV just call and ask them to put us on – Call toll-free 1-844-500-6397 and we will connect you right away to your cable operator!
For more places to Find Newsmax TV – Click Here Now
Reagan argued conservatives "go nuts" when Trump does not "act conservative," but that is because the president is "really not a conservative."
"He's president of the United States, not an ideologue, and he wants to get things done," Reagan said. "He knows the art of the deal, and he wanted to make a deal to get this behind him to be able to move forward, and he was able to do that by working with [Senate Majority Leader Charles] Schumer and [California Democratic Rep. Nancy] Pelosi."
"Maybe the Republicans will wake up and say, 'you know, if we don't want this to happen again, we better be able to deliver the votes when he asks us to deliver the vote,'" he added.
Reagan praised Trump for aiming to "build a coalition of people that will vote for what he wants to have done instead of people who will do nothing but gripe . . . about it."
"This is not the time . . . to be purist, and I think purists in fact get in the way so often at getting things done," he added. "My father found that out, that purists will get in the way. The greatest argument against my father never came from the left, it came from the right because he wasn't pure enough in certain things he needed to get done.
"He had to cave on certain issues to do things and accomplish it so you could call him the greatest president of our generation. But if he doesn't cut deals, that never happens."
© 2025 Newsmax. All rights reserved.