US House Republicans advance Trump tax-cut bill opening way for debate
The Republican-controlled US House of Representatives on Thursday advanced President Donald Trump’s sweeping tax-cut and spending bill, a procedural step setting the stage for possible passage of the legislation in a vote expected later in the day, reports Reuters.
The House voted 219-213 to move forward.
Key events
Steven Greenhouse
Last November, Donald Trump made a solemn vow to all Americans: “Every citizen, I will fight for you, your family and your future every single day.” Eight months later, Trump is vigorously backing many policies that will mean pain for millions.
Trump has pushed to enact the Republican budget bill, which would make significant cuts to Medicaid, Obamacare, and food assistance, and would do the greatest damage to those Americans struggling hardest to make ends meet – the 30% of the US population that lives in households earning under $50,000 a year.
Even as Trump and Republican lawmakers are rushing to cut over $1.4tn in health and food assistance for non-affluent Americans, Trump continues to pressure Congress to extend over $3tn in tax cuts that disproportionately help the wealthy and corporations.
Trump has embraced these Robin-Hood-in-reverse policies, even though it was voters earning less than $50,000 a year who delivered victory to him last November. They favored him over Kamala Harris by 50% to 48%, according to exit polls, while Trump and Harris tied among voters earning $50,000 or more a year.
Several social policy experts said Trump has engaged in hypocrisy at best and betrayal at worst when it comes to the working-class and blue-collar Americans he promised to fight for. Speaking about the Republicans’ “big, beautiful” budget bill, Sharon Parrott, president of the Center for Budget and Policy Priorities, said: “Who’s getting hit, who’s bearing the cost? It’s people with low and middle incomes, people that the president and many Republican policymakers promised to serve and support in the last election.”
Democrat leader Hakeem Jeffries says he is halfway through telling stories of the American people in relation to Medicaid.
He says:
It appears that I am about halfway through the stories as it relates to Medicaid but the extraordinary thing about this bill is that it represents such an unprecedented assault on the American people.
There are stories that need to be told as it relates to the attack on nutritional assistance for the American people. And I will tell those stories. Stories that need to be told as it relates to the attack on farmers in this country. And I will tell those stories.
He goes on to say the bill also represents an attack on small businesses and veterans, who should be able to “live with the dignity and respect that they have earned”.
Elsewhere, US president Donald Trump and Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskyy are expected to discuss the abrupt halt in some key US weapons deliveries to Kyiv in a call on Friday, the Financial Times reported on Thursday.
Zelenskyy would also raise potential future arms sales, the newspaper said, citing people familiar with the planning.
Reuters could not immediately confirm the report.
Jeffries says he will ‘take my sweet time’
Democrat leader Hakeem Jeffries has told the House that he intends to “take my sweet time” telling the stories of the American people who rely on Medicaid.
He says he will keep on reading out letters from people who will be affected by the bill.
Addressing the House, he says:
It had been my hope, Mr Speaker, that we would be able to have a passionate debate of passionate support and passionate opposition and connection with this bill, that hundreds of members of both sides of this aisle had participated in.
Instead we have a limited debate… and because that debate was so limited, I feel the obligation, Mr Speaker, to stand on this House floor and take my sweet time to tell the stories of the American people.
And that’s exactly what I intend to do; take my sweet time on behalf of the American people.
He goes on to list the people he is standing up for and that he plans to “take [my] sweet time” to the applause and cheers from the benches behind him. He highlighted to time (“just gone 6am”) and remember that news agencies were reporting a vote was expected at around 5.30am ET.
Jeffries resumes reading out letters from American people he says will be affected negatively by the president’s bill.
In the latest Guardian Politics Weekly America podcast, Jonathan Freedland is joined by Eleanor Mueller of Semafor to look at the potential fallout from Donald Trump’s tax-and-spending bill – financially and politically.
You can listen to the full episode here.
Politics Weekly America
The winners and losers of Trump’s ‘big, beautiful bill’ – podcast
Democratic leader Hakeem Jeffries is reading out correspondence from people who rely on Medicaid and highlighting its importance in their lives.
In response to ‘Gwendoline from Arizona’, he says:
Let me speak directly… her Representative might not be fighting on your behalf. As House Democrats, we are here to say; we agree.
Medicaid matters and it must be preserved. It must be preserved because Medicaid matters to millions of people all across this great country.
To children, to seniors, to people with disabilities, to women, to families, to people in every corner of the United States of America.
Bill an ‘abomination’ that will ‘reward billionaires’, says Jeffries
Democratic leader Hakeem Jeffries has spoken in “strong opposition of Donald Trump’s one big ugly bill”. Jeffries argued that the bill, that he described as an “abomination”, would gut Medicaid and “rip food from the mouth of children, seniors and veterans”. Instead, he said, it would “reward billionaires with massive tax breaks”.
Jeffries continued:
Every single Democrat stands in strong opposition to this bill because we are standing up for the American people.
He questioned why, if the Republicans were so proud of the bill, the debate had begun in the early hours. Many of his comments were followed by applause.
Jeffries said the bill would “hurt everyday Americans” and “people in America will die unncessary deaths”. He added:
That is outrageous, that is disgusting. That is not what we should be doing here in the United States House of Representatives.
Here are some of the images from the last 24 hours in Washington DC:
It is 4.46am in Washington DC. A final vote is expected at about 5.30 am, according to reports. We will bring updates as soon as they come in.
For the moment, the final debate is taking place and can be followed via the live stream at the top of this blog.
Flanked by nearly every member of his caucus, Democratic leader Hakeem Jeffries, of New York delivered a pointed message: With all Democrats voting “no,” they only need to flip four Republicans to prevent the bill from passing, reports the Associated Press (AP).
Jeffries invoked the “courage” of the late Sen. John McCain giving a thumbs-down to the GOP effort to “repeal and replace” the Affordable Care Act, and singled out Republicans from districts expected to be highly competitive in 2026, including two from Pennsylvania.
“Why would Rob Bresnahan vote for this bill? Why would Scott Perry vote for this bill?” Jeffries asked.
Democrats have described the bill in dire terms, warning that Medicaid cuts would result in lives lost and food stamp cuts would be “literally ripping the food out of the mouths of children, veterans and seniors,” Jeffries said on Monday.
Republicans say they are trying to right-size the safety net programs for the population they were initially designed to serve, mainly pregnant women, disabled people and children, and root out what they describe as waste, fraud and abuse.
The package includes new 80-hour-a-month work requirements for many adults receiving Medicaid and applies existing work requirements in the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP, to more beneficiaries. States will also pick up more of the cost for food benefits.
The driving force behind the bill, however, is the tax cuts. Many expire at the end of this year if Congress doesn’t act.
The Tax Policy Center, which provides nonpartisan analysis of tax and budget policy, projected the bill would result next year in a $150 tax break for the lowest quintile of Americans, a $1,750 tax cut for the middle quintile and a $10,950 tax cut for the top quintile. That’s compared with what they would face if the 2017 tax cuts expired.
With a narrow 220-212 majority, Republicans can afford no more than three defections to get a final bill passed, reports Reuters.
Democrats are united in opposition to the bill, saying that its tax breaks disproportionately benefit the wealthy while cutting services that lower- and middle-income Americans rely on. The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office estimated that almost 12 million people could lose health insurance as a result of the bill.
“This bill is catastrophic. It is not policy, it is punishment,” Democratic representative Jim McGovern said in debate on the House floor.
Republicans in Congress have struggled to stay united in recent years, but they also have not defied Donald Trump since he returned to the White House in January.
Any changes made by the House would require another Senate vote, which would make it all but impossible to meet the 4 July deadline.
The legislation contains most of Trump’s top domestic priorities, from tax cuts to immigration enforcement. The bill would extend Trump’s 2017 tax cuts, cut health and food safety net programs, fund Trump’s immigration crackdown, and zero out many green-energy incentives. It also includes a $5tn increase in the nation’s debt ceiling, which lawmakers must address in the coming months or risk a devastating default.
The Medicaid cuts have also raised concerns among some Republicans, prompting the Senate to set aside more money for rural hospitals.
Now that the House has voted to advance the bill, a final debate on the floor has begun. You can follow it via the live stream video at the top of the blog.
The debate will be followed by a final vote on the bill.
US House Republicans advance Trump tax-cut bill opening way for debate
The Republican-controlled US House of Representatives on Thursday advanced President Donald Trump’s sweeping tax-cut and spending bill, a procedural step setting the stage for possible passage of the legislation in a vote expected later in the day, reports Reuters.
The House voted 219-213 to move forward.
Another update on Scott Perry by way of Fox News’s Chad Pergram and Dan Scully on X:
Johnson on GOP PA Rep Perry on leaving DC to go back to PA. The House is waiting for him to return to the Capitol: It’s a two hour drive home, so he went home to get a change of clothes and all of that. So it’s very practical reason for it.
While we wait for updates, here is a handy explainer of what is in Donald Trump’s major tax bill:
According to multiple reports, Republican Scott Perry returned home to Pennsylvania and the holdouts are unwilling to vote until he returns, as they want to vote as a bloc.
Donald Trump spoke to holdouts by phone early this morning, Fox confirms.
According to the NYT, speaker Mike Johnson said the delay is partly due to members wanting additional time to go through the changes made in the Senate. The publication reports that Johnson told reporters just after 1.30am on Thursday:
It will have all been worth it in the end. And we will meet our July 4 deadline, which everybody mocked when I said it.
House speaker Mike Johnson has said they are “about to get those votes right now” and he expects final vote “by early morning”, reports Chad Pergram, senior congressional correspondent for Fox News.
On the holdouts, Johnson reportedly said: “We’re about to get those votes right now.”
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