We need to have the growth. If we simply look at this as being deficit-neutral, you're never going to get the type of tax reform and tax reductions that you need to get to sustain 3 percent economic growth. We really do believe that the tax code is what's holding back the American economy.

I don't think the criticism is fair. I think the criticism is assuming that Donald Trump giving up on something. He's not. I think if you do end up seeing - if you do end up seeing - some type of agreement regarding DACA and this massive-but-not-wall border security, talking about technology and people, all the things that we need to stop drugs and illegals from coming across the border. If that does become the framework for an agreement that does not mean the president's giving up on his priorities.

If we can get to that 3 percent grow, it is $2 trillion to $2.5 trillion worth of more government revenues. It's 12 million additional jobs. And those are 12 million jobs paying into Medicare, 12 million jobs paying into Social Security. Growth really is what's driving all of this and growth is what our focus is, which is why we're willing to accept increased short-term deficits in exchange for that long-term payoff.

Thing we're trying to add to this is that lower corporate tax rates as we try and spur the economy. So that's where the Donald Trump attention is. The president's attention is on the middle class, making sure that's simple, fair and better. And then on the corporate tax rate, to try and get folks to invest in America again. His focus has not been on the impact on the top 1 percent.

If we had 3 percent growth, which is what we're trying to get to, what we're at, by the way, right now, we're trying to maintain that 3 percent growth. If we had been at 3 percent growth over the last ten years, the budget very nearly would be balanced in 2017. That's how big a difference it makes when you grow the American economy that additional 1 percent over ten years.

The reason we've been growing at 1.8 percent for the last eight, ten years, which is way below the historical average, is in large part because of our tax code. It is important to us to get the biggest, broadest tax reduction, tax cuts, tax reform that we can possibly get because it's the only way we get back to 3 percent growth. That's what's driving all of this, how do you get the American economy back on that historical growth rate of 3 percent and out of these doldrums of 1.8, 1.9 that we had of the previous Barack Obama administration?

When the conversation started to move to the things that we disagreed on, Donald Trump moved it back to the things that we could agree on. I think that's the way you get deals done, right? You and I might disagree 80% of the time but that still gives us 20% opportunity to try to work things out.