In a rare Saturday vote, the US Senate narrowly passed Trump’s ‘Big Beautiful Bill’ as the July 4 deadline approaches. The bill was passed by a 51-49 vote, after Vice-President J.D. Vance broke the tie by casting his vote at the Capitol.
Trump encouraged Republicans to skip their holidays and deliver the bill by July 4. Senators were working through the weekend to pass the bill and send it back to the House for a final vote. Democrats are united against it. However, not all Republicans were on board with the bill.
The Big Beautiful Bill raises concerns among Republicans
In the three-hour holdout and standstill at the Senate, two Republicans opposed the motion to proceed with the bill, joining all Democrats. According to AP reports, some Republicans feel “the cuts go too far” while others believe that “a hit to national debt would be immense and are pushing for steeper cuts.
While Elon Musk stands as the forerunner of voicing his dissent for the Big Beautiful Bill, once again renewing his stance on X, stating “The latest Senate draft bill will destroy millions of jobs in America and cause immense strategic harm to our country,” other Republicans, too, have voiced their concerns.
North Carolina Senator Thom Tillis said he is concerned about the fundamentals of the package and will not support the procedural motion to begin debate. Kentucky Senator Rand Paul opposes the measure to raise the nation's debt limit by $5 trillion. Wisconsin Senator Ron Johnson is pushing for deeper cuts and said he needed to see the final legislative text. Montana Senator Tim Sheehy said he would agree to proceeding to the bill only after being assured a provision for public lands sales he opposes would be taken out with an amendment. All of these senators belong to the Republican Party.
What are the new changes included in the Bill?
In the latest 940-page version of the bill, if all the existing tax breaks are kept and the new ones are added.
The ‘Big Beautiful Bill’ is a tax break package which includes spending cuts and bolstered deportation funds. An estimate from the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office showed that the House-passed version of Trump's tax bill would cost around 10.9 million more people their healthcare, and at least 3 million their food aid. Top income-earners would see about a $12,000 tax cut under the House bill, while the package would cost the poorest Americans $1,600, the CBO said.
Some of the other changes in the bill include an increased proportion of tax deductions for older Americans under Social Security taxes, increasing the deduction limit for state and local taxes (SALT). Money from the cuts would go for hiring 10,000 new ICE, aka Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers, with $10,000 signing bonuses and a surge of Border Patrol officers. The goal is to deport some 1 million people per year.
The bill is expected to cost $3.8 trillion over the decade, the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) said in one of its analyses. The CBO further estimates that the House-passed package would add $2.4 trillion to the nation’s deficits over the next decade.
