Donald Trump won over millions of new working-class voters with his promises to eliminate taxes on tips, overtime pay and Social Security income, and to create a new tax credit for family caregivers. He does not have to wait months to pass a major tax overhaul to deliver on those promises. He can do so immediately on taking office. Here’s how:

With Republicans in control of the Senate, the House and the White House, they can make good on these vows with simple majority votes in both chambers using the budget reconciliation process. Every year, the House and Senate are supposed to adopt a budget resolution to establish an overall budget. Both houses then pass a budget reconciliation bill that makes changes to tax and spending policy — and is voted on in the Senate using expedited rules that prevent the minority from delaying or filibustering it. This is how Trump passed his 2017 tax reform with only Republican votes, and how President Joe Biden passed his American Rescue Plan and Inflation Reduction acts with only Democratic votes.

But next year, Trump will have an extraordinary opportunity to pass not one, but two budget reconciliation bills. That’s because the Republican House and Democratic Senate could not agree on a 2025 budget resolution. This means that when the new Republican Congress is seated in January, it can enact two budget resolutions during Trump’s first year in office — one for fiscal 2025 and a second for fiscal 2026. That will allow Congress to pass, and Trump to sign, two budget reconciliation bills related to tax policy with only Republican votes next year.

Because Trump gets two bites at the apple in 2025, he does not have to wait until a major tax overhaul is ready to deliver on his promised tax cuts. He can pass them immediately using the first budget reconciliation bill, and then use the second bill to enact more complicated tax reform, which will take many months to prepare and negotiate, later in the year.

The first step

How would this work? When the new Congress is seated Jan. 3, it can immediately enact a 2025 budget resolution, even before Trump is inaugurated. Then, as soon as Trump takes the oath of office, Congress can send him a budget reconciliation bill that eliminates taxes on tips, overtime and Social Security income and creates his promised caregiver tax credit.

Those tax cuts could be paid for by repealing the climate spending in Biden’s Inflation Reduction Act, eliminating the $80 billion Biden gave the Internal Revenue Service, and enacting JD Vance’s College Endowment Accountability Act, which would raise the excise tax on college and university endowment investment income from 1.4% to 35%. There would be poetic justice in cutting taxes for working-class Americans and making elite universities such as Harvard, Columbia and MIT pay for it.

Trump could also use that first reconciliation bill to fund his border wall and add thousands of U.S. Border Patrol officers and Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents to carry out another major campaign promise — the mass deportation of illegal migrants.

If Republican leaders in Congress and Trump’s transition team start working now, the president could sign such a bill into law in a matter of weeks. Imagine the momentum it would give his new presidency if he could immediately deliver on his promises to so many new voters who cast ballots for him. Rarely in American history have voters gotten such near-instantaneous results for their votes.

Once that first reconciliation bill is enacted, Congress can pass a second budget resolution for the 2026 fiscal year and get to work on a major tax overhaul. Trump can use that bill to extend his 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act for 10 years and enact major tax reform, delivering on other campaign promises such as reducing the corporate tax rate.

The trifecta

And he doesn’t have to stop there. Because in 2026 he will get a third bite at the apple. As of Jan. 1, 2026, Congress can pass a budget resolution for fiscal 2027. That will give Trump a third Republican-votes-only reconciliation bill, which could be used to implement all the spending cuts and government reforms recommended by Trump’s new “Department of Government Efficiency.”

If Trump follows this strategy, he will have signed at least three major bills before voters go to the polls in the 2026 midterms — one fulfilling his promises to cut taxes for working Americans; a second delivering major tax reform to boost economic growth and competitiveness; and a third streamlining government and eliminating wasteful spending.

That would be a trifecta of unprecedented achievements that voters would almost certainly reward.

Knowing that he can pass three budget reconciliation bills in two years, it would be foolhardy of Trump to wait to act until a major tax overhaul bill is ready. Polls show that six in 10 Americans approve of his transition.

Marc A. Thiessen is a Washington Post columnist.