{"id":593,"date":"2025-07-01T17:23:56","date_gmt":"2025-07-01T17:23:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blog.cedritech.com\/?p=593"},"modified":"2025-07-01T17:23:56","modified_gmt":"2025-07-01T17:23:56","slug":"senate-passes-trumps-big-tax-breaks-and-spending-cuts-bill-as-vance-breaks-50-50-tie","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.cedritech.com\/?p=593","title":{"rendered":"Senate passes Trump\u2019s big tax breaks and spending cuts bill as Vance breaks 50-50 tie"},"content":{"rendered":"

WASHINGTON (AP) \u2014 Senate Republicans hauled\u00a0President Donald Trump\u2019s<\/a>\u00a0big\u00a0tax breaks and spending cuts bill<\/a>\u00a0to passage Tuesday on the narrowest of margins, pushing past opposition from Democrats and their own GOP ranks after a turbulent overnight session.<\/p>\n

The outcome capped an unusually tense weekend of work at the Capitol, the president\u2019s signature legislative priority teetering on the edge of approval or collapse. In the end that tally was 50-50, with Vice President JD Vance casting the tie-breaking vote.<\/p>\n

Three Republican senators \u2014 Thom Tillis of North Carolina, Susan Collins of Maine and Rand Paul of Kentucky \u2014 joined all Democrats in voting against it.<\/p>\n

“The big not so beautiful bill has passed,\u201d Paul said after the vote.<\/p>\n

The difficulty it took for Republicans, who have the majority hold in Congress, to wrestle the bill to this point is not expected to let up. The package now goes back to the House, where\u00a0Speaker Mike Johnson<\/a>\u00a0had warned senators not to deviate too far from what his chamber had already approved. But the Senate did make changes, particularly to Medicaid, risking more problems as they race to finish by Trump\u2019s Fourth of July deadline.<\/p>\n

The outcome is a pivotal moment for president and his party, which have been consumed by the 940-page\u00a0\u201cOne Big Beautiful Bill Act,\u201d<\/a>\u00a0as it\u2019s formally titled, and invested their political capital in delivering on the GOP’s sweep of power in Washington.<\/p>\n

Donald Trump<\/a>\u00a0acknowledged it\u2019s \u201cvery complicated stuff,\u201d as he\u00a0departed the White House for Florida<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t want to go too crazy with cuts,” he said. “I don\u2019t like cuts.\u201d<\/p>\n

What started as a routine but laborious day of amendment voting, in a process called vote-a-rama, spiraled into a round-the-clock slog as Republican leaders were buying time to shore up support.<\/p>\n

The droning roll calls in the chamber belied the frenzied action to steady the bill. Grim-faced scenes played out on and off the Senate floor, amid exhaustion.<\/p>\n

Senate Majority Leader John Thune of South Dakota<\/a> was desperately reaching for last-minute agreements between those in his party worried the bill’s reductions to Medicaid will leave millions without care, and his most conservative flank, which wants even steeper cuts to hold down deficits ballooning with the tax cuts.<\/p>\n

The GOP leaders have no room to spare, with narrow majorities. Thune could lose no more than three Republican senators, and two \u2014\u00a0Tillis<\/a>, who warned that millions of people will lose access to Medicaid health care, and Paul, who opposes raising the debt limit by $5 trillion \u2014 had already indicated opposition.<\/p>\n

Attention quickly turned to two other key senators, Lisa Murkowski of Alaska and Collins, who also raised concerns about health care cuts, as well as a loose coalition of four conservative GOP senators pushing for even steeper reductions.<\/p>\n

Murkowski in particular became the subject of the GOP leadership\u2019s attention, as they sat beside her for talks. She was huddled intensely for more than an hour in the back of the chamber with others, scribbling notes on papers.<\/p>\n

Then all eyes were on Paul after he returned from a visit to Thune\u2019s office with a stunning offer that could win his vote. He had suggested substantially lowering the bill’s increase in the debt ceiling, according to two people familiar with the private meeting and granted anonymity to discuss it.<\/p>\n

Senate Democratic Leader\u00a0Chuck Schumer<\/a>\u00a0of New York said \u201cRepublicans are in shambles because they know the bill is so unpopular.”<\/p>\n

An analysis<\/a>\u00a0from\u00a0the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office<\/a>\u00a0found 11.8 million more Americans would become uninsured by 2034 if the bill became law. The\u00a0CBO said<\/a>\u00a0the package would increase the deficit by nearly $3.3 trillion over the decade.<\/p>\n

And on social media, billionaire\u00a0Elon Musk<\/a>\u00a0was again lashing out at Republicans as \u201cthe PORKY PIG PARTY!!\u201d for including the $5 trillion debt ceiling in the package, which is needed to allow continued borrowing to pay the bills.<\/p>\n

Senators insist on changes<\/p>\n

Few Republicans appeared fully satisfied as the final package emerged, in either the House or the Senate.<\/p>\n

Collins had proposed bolstering the $25 billion proposed rural hospital fund to $50 billion, offset with a higher tax rate on those earning more than $25 million a year, but her amendment failed.<\/p>\n

And Murkowski was trying to secure provisions to spare people in her state from some food stamp cuts, which appeared to be accepted, while she was also working to beef up federal reimbursements to hospitals in Alaska and others states, that did not comply with parliamentary rules.<\/p>\n

What’s in the big bill<\/p>\n

All told, the Senate bill includes $4.5 trillion in tax cuts, according to the latest CBO analysis, making permanent\u00a0Trump’s 2017 rates<\/a>, which would expire at the end of the year if Congress fails to act, while adding the new ones he campaigned on, including\u00a0no taxes on tips<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The Senate package would roll back billions of dollars in\u00a0green energy tax credits<\/a>, which Democrats warn will wipe out wind and solar investments nationwide. It would impose $1.2 trillion in cuts, largely to\u00a0Medicaid<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0food stamps<\/a>, by imposing work requirements on able-bodied people, including some parents and older Americans, making sign-up eligibility more stringent and changing federal reimbursements to states.<\/p>\n

Additionally, the bill would provide a $350 billion infusion for\u00a0border and national security<\/a>, including for deportations, some of it paid for with new fees charged to\u00a0immigrants<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Democrats fighting all day and night<\/p>\n

Unable to stop the march toward passage, the Democrats tried to drag out the process, including with a weekend reading of the full bill.<\/p>\n

A few of the Democratic amendments won support from a few Republicans, though almost none passed. More were considered in one of the longer such sessions in modern times.<\/p>\n

One amendment overwhelmingly approved stripped a provision barring states from regulating\u00a0artificial intelligence<\/a>\u00a0if they receive certain federal funding.<\/p>\n

Sen. Patty Murray of Washington, the ranking Democrat on the Appropriations Committee, raised particular concern about the accounting method being used by the Republicans, which says the tax breaks from Trump’s first term are now \u201ccurrent policy\u201d and the cost of extending them should not be counted toward deficits.<\/p>\n

She said that kind of \u201cmagic math\u201d won’t fly with Americans trying to balance their own household books.<\/p>\n

Associated Press writers Joey Cappelletti, Darelene Superville and Kevin Freking contributed to this report<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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