House Freedom Caucus leaders told White House officials this week that Republicans need to release a tax plan soon — or the conservative group may put out one of its own.

Freedom Caucus Chairman Mark Meadows (R-N.C.) and Vice Chairman Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) delivered that message Thursday to Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin and National Economic Council Director Gary Cohn, the top officials leading the tax effort for the White House. Mnuchin and Cohn, along with White House legislative liaison Marc Short, who was also at the meeting, do not want the group to release any text, fearful it will prevent Republicans from uniting behind one plan.

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Meadows, in a brief interview Friday afternoon, downplayed the possibility that the group would release its own legislation, adding that the White House has assured him action is imminent. But conservatives are eager to deliver on a major campaign promise after the Obamacare repeal bill died in the Senate. And if that means forging ahead on their own, they’re not ruling it out.

“I’m not threatening my own tax bill if we don’t get our way,” Meadows said. “At the same time, if we don’t make decisions in the near term on what we’re going to do, [we might] put forth something.”

Meadows added: “Every day that goes by, there is less and less of a chance of getting it done before the end of the year. And so for us, it’s all about promoting real dialogue right away, and we’ve been assured real dialogue right away is forthcoming.”

White House officials would prefer to not deal with Freedom Caucus dissent. But they're also concerned about keeping conservatives in the fold after Trump cut a budget deal this week with Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) and House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), startling his own party.

When Mnuchin met with Republicans on Friday morning and asked them to vote for the deal, he was jeered and hissed by the room.

Trump encouraged legislators to “hurry” on a tax plan in September. But debates are still ongoing between the House and the Senate on the specifics, including whether to allow immediate business expensing and deciding how much the corporate tax rate can be lowered. And Trump has repeatedly pushed for a 15 percent rate behind the scenes, even as some of his top advisers, including Cohn, say it is not mathematically possible.

The possibility of the Freedom Caucus going rogue on tax reform petrifies administration and Capitol Hill Republicans working on the issue. GOP leaders believe that a single, unified tax bill backed by Trump, the House and the Senate is critical to success.

It’s the very reason that Cohn and Mnuchin have been meeting weekly with House Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wis.), Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), along with the GOP chairmen of the House and Senate tax panels — a group known as the Big Six.

Conservatives, however, also want a seat at the table and are eager to see a plan and influence the text. There’s a palpable fear that the Big Six will release a plan and try to jam conservatives — just as they did with health care.

“My conversations with the White House as well as the speaker [are], ‘Let's make some decisions and start debating the merits of those rates and expensing models and everything that goes into a tax reform package,’” Meadows said. “To allow the Big Six or the Secret Six to negotiate something, then to give everyone a binary choic,e is not something that will necessarily represent a broad swath of the GOP conference.”

Conservatives are desperate for a win to show to constituents back home. An antsy Meadows ticked off six major tax reform questions that no one has answered, from the exact corporate tax to how business expensing will be handled. “Those are six items that you and I can’t answer, and if we can’t answer them, then we don’t have any idea what we’re doing on tax reform,” he said.

Meadows said there are several Freedom Caucus members crafting tax legislation. And Axios reported earlier this week that one such plan would lower the corporate tax rate to 16 percent — a much more aggressive cut than the Big Six believes Congress can achieve.

But the meeting appears to have persuaded conservatives to hold off—at least for now.

“The only way that a plan from the Freedom Caucus would be introduced is if there is inaction on behalf of the Big Six, and we’re still talking about principles weeks from now,” said Meadows, who argued that there was “no need” for his group to drop a plan at the moment.

“I’m not saying that I’ll never put out a bill,” he continued. “But as long as they put out a bill and negotiate in good faith over the next few weeks, there will be no Freedom Caucus bill or a need for a Freedom Caucus bill.”