Trump's ‘big, beautiful Bill' clears first US Senate hurdle after GOP drama
WASHINGTON, June 29 — The Republican-controlled US Senate advanced President Donald Trump's sweeping tax-cut and spending Bill in a key procedural vote late yesterday, raising the odds that lawmakers will be able to pass his 'big, beautiful Bill' in the coming days.
The measure, Trump's top legislative goal, passed its first procedural hurdle in a 51 to 49 vote, with two Republican senators voting against it.
The result came after several hours of negotiation as Republican leaders and Vice President JD Vance sought to persuade last-minute holdouts in a series of closed-door negotiations.
The procedural vote, which would start debate on the 940-page mega-Bill to fund Trump's top immigration, border, tax-cut and military priorities, began after hours of delay.
It then remained open for more than three hours of standstill as three Republican senators — Thom Tillis, Ron Johnson and Rand Paul - joined Democrats to oppose the legislation. Three others - Senators Rick Scott, Mike Lee and Cynthia Lummis — negotiated with Republican leaders into the night in hopes of securing bigger spending cuts.
In the end, Wisconsin Senator Johnson flipped his no vote to yes, leaving only Paul and Tillis opposed among Republicans.
Trump was monitoring the vote from the Oval Office late into the night, a senior White House official said.
The mega-Bill would extend the 2017 tax cuts that were Trump's main legislative achievement during his first term as president, cut other taxes and boost spending on the military and border security.
Nonpartisan analysts estimate that a version of Trump's tax-cut and spending Bill would add trillions to the US$36.2 trillion (RM153 trillion) US government debt.
Democrats fiercely opposed the Bill, saying its tax-cut elements would disproportionately benefit the wealthy at the expense of social programs that lower-income Americans rely upon.
Chuck Schumer, the Senate's top Democrat, demanded that the Bill be read aloud before debate could begin, saying the Senate Republicans were scrambling to pass a 'radical Bill'.
'If Senate Republicans won't tell the American people what's in this Bill, then Democrats are going to force this chamber to read it from start to finish,' the New York Democrat said. — Reuters
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
New Straits Times
3 hours ago
- New Straits Times
US Senate approves Trump's 'One Big Beautiful Bill'
MOSCOW: The US Senate has approved President Donald Trump's "One Big Beautiful Bill" by a majority vote, reported Sputnik/RIA Novosti citing a NBC News report. The lower house of the US Congress in May passed a bill promoted by Trump that cuts federal spending but simultaneously provides significant tax breaks. As a result, according to the Congressional Budget Office, both the budget deficit and the national debt will grow. It is noted that 51 people voted for the bill, 49 voted against it. The day before, US billionaire entrepreneur Elon Musk criticised the latest version of the bill on cutting government spending, saying that the document could destroy millions of jobs in the United States.
Malay Mail
3 hours ago
- Malay Mail
Meta raids OpenAI again, adds four more AI researchers
SAN FRANCISCO, June 29 — Meta Platforms is hiring four more OpenAI artificial intelligence researchers, The Information reported yesterday. The researchers, Shengjia Zhao, Jiahui Yu, Shuchao Bi and Hongyu Ren, have each agreed to join, the report said, citing a person familiar with their hiring. Earlier this week, the Instagram parent hired Lucas Beyer, Alexander Kolesnikov and Xiaohua Zhai, who were all working in OpenAI's Zurich office, the Wall Street Journal reported. Meta and ChatGPT maker OpenAI did not immediately respond to a Reuters request for comment. The company has recently been pushing to hire more researchers from OpenAI to join chief executive Mark Zuckerberg's superintelligence efforts. Reuters could not immediately verify the report. — Reuters
New Straits Times
3 hours ago
- New Straits Times
US Senate opens debate on Trump's controversial spending bill
WASHINGTON: US senators on Saturday began debating Donald Trump's "big beautiful" spending bill, a hugely divisive proposal that would deliver key parts of the US president's domestic agenda while making massive cuts to social welfare programs. Trump is hoping to seal his legacy with the "One Big Beautiful Bill," which would extend his expiring first-term tax cuts at a cost of US$4.5 trillion and beef up border security. But Republicans eyeing 2026 midterm congressional elections are divided over the package, which would strip health care from millions of the poorest Americans and add more than US$3 trillion to the country's debt. The Senate formally opened debate on the bill late Saturday, after Republican holdouts delayed what should have been a procedural vote – drawing Trump's ire on social media. Senators narrowly passed the motion to begin debate, 51-49, hours after the vote was first called, with Vice President JD Vance joining negotiations with holdouts from his own party. Ultimately, two Republican senators joined 47 Democrats in voting "nay" on opening debate. Trump has pushed his party to get the bill passed and on his desk for him to sign into law by July 4, the United States' independence day. Democrats are bitterly opposed to the legislation and Trump's agenda, and have vowed to hold up the debate. They began by insisting that the entirety of the bill be read aloud to the chamber before the debate commences. The bill is roughly 1,000 pages long and will take an estimated 15 hours to read. "Republicans won't tell America what's in the bill," said Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer. "So Democrats are forcing it to be read start to finish on the floor. We will be here all night if that's what it takes to read it." If passed in the Senate, the bill would go back to the House for approval, where Republicans can only afford to lose a handful of votes – and are facing stiff opposition from within their own ranks. Republicans are scrambling to offset the US$4.5 trillion cost of Trump's tax relief, with many of the proposed cuts to come from decimating funding for Medicaid, the health insurance program for low-income Americans. Republicans are split on the Medicaid cuts, which will threaten scores of rural hospitals and lead to an estimated 8.6 million Americans being deprived of health care. The spending plan would also roll back many of the tax incentives for renewable energy that were put in place under Trump's predecessor Joe Biden. On Saturday, key Trump ally Elon Musk – with whom the president had a public falling out this month over his criticism of the bill – called the current proposal "utterly insane and destructive." "It gives handouts to industries of the past while severely damaging industries of the future," said Musk, who is the world's richest person, and owns electric vehicle company Tesla and space flight firm SpaceX, among others. Independent analysis also shows that the bill would pave the way for a historic redistribution of wealth from the poorest 10 per cent of Americans to the richest. The bill is unpopular across multiple demographic, age and income groups, according to extensive recent polling. Although the House has already passed its own version, both chambers have to agree on the same text before it can be signed into law.
