House passes Trump's sweeping tax-cut bill and sends it to Senate
By: Chris J. Stein (the Guardian)
Well, well, well. The House Speaker ain't an empty suit, after all. Mike Johnson has repeatedly proven he can do the job. The Honorable Representative from Louisiana has earned a round of applause.
S E E D E D C O N T E N T
Republicans in the House of Representatives won passage on Thursday of a major bill to enact Donald Trump's tax and spending priorities while adding trillions of dollars to the US debt and potentially prevent millions of Americans from accessing federal safety net benefits.
The One Big Beautiful Bill Act was approved in the early morning hours along party lines by the slim Republican majority, with 215 votes in favor and 214 against. Its passage ended weeks of negotiations that drew into question the GOP's ability to find agreement on Trump's top legislative priority in a chamber they control by just three seats.
"I give glory to God. I mean, there's a lot of prayer that brought this together, I'm just going to be very blunt about it. There was a few moments over the last week when it looked like the thing might fall apart," the House speaker, Mike Johnson, said after the bill's passage.
Trump cheered the vote and encouraged the Senate to pass the measure quickly. "This is arguably the most significant piece of Legislation that will ever be signed in the History of our Country!" he wrote on Truth Social. "Now, it's time for our friends in the United States Senate to get to work, and send this Bill to my desk AS SOON AS POSSIBLE! There is no time to waste."
The bill will make good on several of Trump's campaign promises, including extending tax cuts for individuals and corporations, and sunsetting clean energy incentives enacted under Joe Biden. It also relieves taxes on tips, overtime and car loan interest, offers parents $1,000 if they open "Trump accounts" for their children and expands a deduction for older taxpayers - though only for as long as Trump remains in office.
The bill also pays for construction of a wall along the border with Mexico, and new staff and facilities for mass deportations of undocumented immigrants.
To offset its costs, the GOP has approved funding cuts and new work requirements for Medicaid, which provides healthcare for poor and disabled Americans, and the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (Snap). Analysts fear these changes will bar millions from these benefits.
Even with the cuts, the measure is expected to cost $3.8tn over the next 10 years, according to the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office. Its passage in the House comes less than a week after credit ratings agency Moody's stripped the US of its top-notch triple-A rating and warned of its large national debt and federal budget deficit.
House Democratic leaders have decried the bill as a "tax scam" that "is deeply unpopular, which is why Republicans made every effort to advance it during the dead of night".
"This fight is just beginning, and House Democrats will continue to use every tool at our disposal to ensure that the GOP Tax Scam is buried deep in the ground, never to rise again," the minority leader, Hakeem Jeffries, the whip, Katherine Clark, and the caucus chair, Pete Aguilar, said.
The bill also drew rare condemnation from Barack Obama. "Right now, Republicans in Congress are trying to push through a bill that would put millions of Americans at risk of losing their healthcare. They want to cut federal funding for Medicaid, take away tax credits that help more people afford coverage and raise costs for working-class families," the former president said. He encouraged people to contact their senators to oppose the measure.
Democratic lawmakers' options are limited. The party is in the minority in both chambers, and Republicans are following the budget reconciliation procedure to prevent it from facing a filibuster in the Senate.
The biggest obstacle the bill faces are disputes among Republicans themselves. In the days leading up to the vote, Johnson had to reach agreements with lawmakers representing Democratic-led states who demanded a bigger deduction for state and local taxes (Salt). He also had to woo moderates wary of cutting too deeply to safety net programs and rightwing lawmakers demanding more cost savings.
The speaker appears to have bridged those divides, aided by a visit to the Capitol from Trump on Tuesday. Moderates backed down after some cuts were nixed, while lawmakers who held out over Salt won an enlarged tax break. Johnson also managed to corral most fiscal conservatives, with Kentucky's Thomas Massie and Ohio's Warren Davidson the sole no votes on the bill, both of whom cited its impact on the deficit.
"This bill is a debt bomb ticking," Massie said as the bill was debated. "We're not rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic tonight. We're putting coal in the boiler and setting a course for the iceberg."
The legislation now heads to the Senate, where Republicans say they would like to have it on Trump's desk by 4 July, the Independence Day holiday.
Tags
Who is online
517 visitors
The progressive left and Democrats want to spend even more and reinstate the SALT deductions that shield the rich Federal from income taxes. So, don't complain that the Big Beautiful Bill doesn't do enough.
The More things change…..
a republican house passes a bill overflowing with left wing goodies.
Ain't it a wonder? Democrats are pissed because there's not enough racial division in the bill.
There are both republican and democratic "goodies" in this bill ( though I am not sure what the democratic "goodies" are ). But notwithstanding all that, it is a very bad bill.
Here Are the Worst Things in Trump’s Big, Beautiful Bill
Trump and Johnson’s Big Ugly Lie
Trump’s big bill is terrible in all the normal Republican ways
Free shit for worthless takers.
Oh, no, Trump isn't follow the neoliberal Republican supply-side playbook. It's the end of the world!
Did Democrats really think Kamala Harris could revive Bill Clinton's legacy and save neoliberalism?
The billionaire tax cuts. We agree!
And they will still bitch
"To offset its costs, the GOP has approved funding cuts and new work requirements for Medicaid, which provides healthcare for poor and disabled Americans, and the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (Snap). Analysts fear these changes will bar millions from these benefits."
Yes, it may bar some folks from these benefits. It seems they are targeting able bodied people from defrauding the government. Of course dems are against this. It doesn't allow them to buy votes of people sucking the governments teats when they should get a job and pay for insurance like the rest of us.
Pelosi wasn't even subtle about this, she literally said it allows people to sit at home and follow their passion, paint, play music without having to worry about health insurance.
They must be looking to upgrade the singing at their lame sing along protests.
"So, it's our white races motto?"
‘able bodied people from defrauding the government.’
Actually, they are defrauding those of us that pay taxes…..ie….they are stealing from you and I
Vomit. If this was proposed by Biden and conservative parents had to open "Biden Accounts" to get a $1000 the rightwing would be screaming in outrage. Of course because it has their Dear Leaders name tramp-stamped on it they'll no doubt sing its praises and claim its the best thing since sliced bread. Hypocrites.
The bulk of which will be for the corporations getting their fat tax break extended. The piddling individual cuts won't even be felt but I'm sure the belly crawlers will come out and defend them as if they're super beneficial for middle income American families.
It's amusing you don't think middle class families care about thousands of dollars.
Biden did propose work requirements during the 2023 debt ceiling negotiations. Biden opposed work requirements for Medicaid but agreed to work requirements for SNAP. The Big Beautiful Bill builds upon what Biden signed into law to get a debt ceiling increase.
That $3.8 trillion/10 year price tag includes tax exemptions on tips, overtime pay, and car loans. Extending the tax cuts from Trump's first term doesn't add to the deficit over the next ten years because they are already in effect.
Instead he invited gang members across the border and gave them luxury hotel rooms and thousands.
I know, that goes against the "tax the rich" bullshit. I'm sure you'll survive.
One of Biden's past campaign promises was "Kids Accounts" proposed in 2008. The Federal government would deposit the first $500 into the Kids Account. Parents and grandparents could deposit $1,000 per year into the Kids Account. For low-income children the Federal government would match $500 of savings each year.
So, Biden already proposed Biden Accounts at one time. It didn't help him win the election though, so it was dropped.
and Trump accounts?
So exactly like the Biden proposal! /s
The fact that you even attempted some sort of 'what-about-ism' between the two is frankly stunning.
Well obviously the Trump Accounts and Biden's Kids Accounts are not the same. The Trump Accounts are more generous. And Biden was only trying to buy votes using taxpayer money. Biden certainly did not promote the idea after becoming Vice President.
He'll be upset that you won't be voting for him.
Voting for who? Didn't you get the memo? Biden never happened.
Whatever you have to tell yourself.. LOL
Biden's kids served in the military....which of trump's parasite kids served?
How much do you have to make to qualify?