WASHINGTON—The U.S. House approved the “big, beautiful bill” on May 22 that Republican leaders spent months negotiating with centrists and far-right members of the party—two distinct factions that hold vastly different policy goals—over intense opposition from Democrats.
The 215-214 vote ships the package to the Senate, where GOP lawmakers are expected to rewrite much of it, before sending it back across the Capitol for final approval, a process likely to stretch through the summer.
President Donald Trump, who said he backed the House version, would then need to sign the legislation, which under the complicated process being used by Republicans can pass with just a majority vote in the GOP-controlled Senate.
Speaker Mike Johnson said minutes before the vote that he expects lawmakers to give the measure final approval before the Fourth of July.
“Now, look, we’re accomplishing a big thing here today, but we know this isn’t the end of the road just yet,” Johnson, R-La., said. “We’ve been working closely with Leader (John) Thune and our Senate colleagues, the Senate Republicans, to get this done and delivered to the president’s desk by our Independence Day. That’s July 4. Today proves that we can do that, and we will do that.”
House Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y., argued against the legislation, saying it “undermines reproductive freedom, undermines the progress that we have made in combating the climate crisis, undermines gun safety, undermines the rule of law and the independence of the federal judiciary. It even undermines the ability of hard-working and law-abiding immigrant families to provide remittances to their loved ones, who may just happen to live abroad.”
Jeffries raised concerns with how the proposals in the bill would impact the economy and the federal government’s financial stability.
“Costs aren’t going down. They’re going up. Inflation is out of control. Insurance rates remain stubbornly high,” Jeffries said. “Our Moody’s rating, our credit rating, has been downgraded, and you’ve got people losing confidence in this economy. Republicans are crashing this economy in real time and driving us toward a recession.”
Alaska’s sole representative, Nick Begich, voted in favor of the bill.
Ohio’s Warren Davidson and Kentucky’s Thomas Massie were the only Republicans to vote against passing the bill, which members debated throughout the night prior to the vote just after daylight in the nation’s capital. All Democrats, who dubbed it “one big ugly bill,” were opposed. Maryland GOP Rep. Andy Harris, chairman of the Freedom Caucus, voted “present.”
Massie spoke against the bill, calling it “a debt bomb ticking.”
The legislation would:
-Extend the 2017 tax law, including tax cuts for businesses and individuals;
-Bolster spending on border security and defense by hundreds of billions of dollars;
-Rework energy permitting;
-Restructure higher education aid such as student loans and Pell Grants;
-Shift some of the cost of the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program food aid program for low-income Americans to state governments; and
-Overhaul Medicaid, the nation’s program for health care for low-income people and some people with
disabilities.
This story was first reported by the Alaska Beacon. Alaska Beacon stories may be republished online or in print under Creative Commons license CC BY-NC-ND 4.0.
