Overnight Finance: CBO predicts budget deficits, debt to hit new highs in 30 years | Meet Trump’s Ms. Fix-It | Trump, Mnuchin talk tax reform | Mexico’s $17B windfall

Trump meets with Mnuchin in ‘first stages’ of tax reform planning: President Trump on Thursday met with Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin about tax reform, White House press secretary Sean Spicer said, as the White House enters the “first stages” of tackling the issue.

Trump has said he wants to shift his focus to tax reform after efforts to repeal and replace ObamaCare stalled. The president’s goal is cutting taxes for businesses and middle-class families. Here’s more from The Hill’s Naomi Jagoda: http://bit.ly/2nAVGIP.

CBO: Budget deficits, debt to reach record highs in 30 years: Federal budget deficits in the United States will more than triple over the next three decades, leading to a record level of publicly held debt by 2047, the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office (CBO) projected Thursday.

Budget deficits — the differences between U.S. yearly revenues and expenditures — are set to increase from 2.9 percent to 9.8 percent by 2047, skyrocketing the federal debt from 77 to 150 percent of the country’s GDP, according to the CBO’s long-term budget projection released Thursday. I’ll tell you what’s behind the spike here: http://bit.ly/2nATDVb.

Meet President Trump’s Ms. Fix-It: Dina Powell is the Trump administration’s Ms. Fix-It. The deputy national security adviser for strategy, one of the few White House aides with extensive experience in a past Republican administration, has taken on a large list of responsibilities touching on foreign and domestic policy.

{mosads}Besides serving as a deputy to national security adviser H.R. McMaster, Powell was asked by senior adviser Jared Kushner, the president’s son-in-law, to serve in a new office tasked with using private-sector ideas to overhaul the federal government. The Hill’s Jordan Fabian reports: http://bit.ly/2nBfV9y.

Happy Thursday and welcome to Overnight Finance. I’m Sylvan Lane, and here’s your nightly guide to everything affecting your bills, bank account and bottom line.

Tonight’s highlights include tumultuous times for the peso, a green light for two Trump cabinet picks, weed and an alpaca.

See something I missed? Let me know at slane@digital-release.thehill.com or tweet me @SylvanLane. And if you like your newsletter, you can subscribe to it here: http://bit.ly/1NxxW2N.

GOP senator downplays shutdown threat: Sen. James Lankford (R-Okla.) on Thursday downplayed the threat of a government shutdown next month, saying Congress works best under a deadline.

“We’re working through that over the next three weeks,” Lankford said on CNN’s “New Day.” “We’ve got three weeks and then we’ll bring these bills to the floor. By the 28th of April, we have to have all funding done at that point or have a continuing resolution.” http://bit.ly/2nAYeXu.

Senate panel approves Trump’s Agriculture pick: Former Georgia Gov. Sonny Perdue (R) moved a step closer toward becoming President Trump’s secretary of Agriculture.

The Senate Agriculture Committee on Thursday by voice vote approved Perdue to helm the agency, sending his nomination to the Senate floor as Trump inches closer toward filling out his Cabinet.

“I’m pleased our committee has made swift strides to move Gov. Perdue’s nomination closer to the finish line,” said panel Chairman Pat Roberts (R-Kan.). The Hill’s Vicki Needham has more: http://bit.ly/2nAXxgO.

Senate committee advances Trump’s Labor pick: President Trump’s Plan B on labor cleared a key Senate hurdle Thursday.

The Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee voted 12-11 along party lines to send Labor secretary nominee Alexander Acosta to the floor for final approval.

Trump picked Acosta after his first choice, restaurant executive Andrew Puzder, withdrew himself from consideration in February amid questions about how his restaurant chains treated workers, why he had employed an undocumented immigrant as a housekeeper and abuse accusations from his ex-wife. The Hill’s Tim Devaney reports: http://bit.ly/2ogCR0T.

Mexico nets $17 billion on Trump-led peso decline: The Mexican federal government received 321.7 billion pesos, or $17.1 billion, from its central bank’s yearly profits, driven in large part by a Trump-triggered plunge in the peso’s value.

Banxico, the country’s central bank, on Wednesday reported record-breaking profits, which by law are shared with the Secretariat of Finance and Public Credit, the country’s equivalent of the Treasury Department.

Banxico’s record-breaking surplus is more than $4 billion higher than last year’s, reported Bloomberg.

A 20 percent drop in the peso’s value against the dollar boosted the country’s foreign currency reserves, stimulating Banxico’s bottom line.

The decline was mostly due to fears of what President Trump’s election would mean for the Mexican economy: http://bit.ly/2nAPqkp.

Pot state Dems want federal regulation of marijuana: Democrats from states where marijuana is legal say so many Americans have access to pot products that the federal government should begin regulating the industry, which generated more than $7 billion in sales last year.

New legislation introduced by Sen. Ron Wyden and Rep. Earl Blumenauer, both Oregon Democrats, would take marijuana off the list of federally banned drugs, tax marijuana at a rate similar to alcohol and tobacco, and end the threat of federal criminal penalties for businesses operating in states that allow the use of pot for recreational purposes.

Under the legislation, marijuana businesses would gain access to the regulated banking system. Many banks currently are reluctant to open accounts for marijuana businesses because of fears that the federal government could seize the money. The Hill’s Reid Wilson explains: http://bit.ly/2nB9mUf.

Flake teases report with plea to protect alpacas from ‘tax code abuse’: Sen. Jeff Flake (R-Ariz.) is using video in the style of the iconic ASPCA spots to tease the release of an upcoming oversight report on tax loopholes.

In the video, Flake urges viewers to “be the answer for an innocent alpaca, who is being used as a tax shelter,” and instructs them to download a report from his Senate website on April 5 that will detail unusual loopholes used to lower tax liabilities.

“By doing so you’ll be helping me in an effort to save alpacas and other outlandish loopholes from tax code abuse,” Flake continues. “This is your chance to say, ‘I won’t sit idly by while even one alpaca is written off.'” http://bit.ly/2nAX4es.

Join us Wednesday, May 3 for “Main Street Matters: Jobs, Wages & the Small Business Economy,” featuring Sen. Jeanne Shaheen (D-N.H.) and Rep. Steve Chabot (R-Ohio). Topics of discussion include job creation, wages and the kinds of policies that can help small businesses thrive in the United States. RSVP Here.

Write us with tips, suggestions and news: slane@digital-release.thehill.com, vneedham@digital-release.thehill.com, and njagoda@digital-release.thehill.com. Follow us on Twitter: @SylvanLane,  @VickofTheHill and @NJagoda.