Fourth of July travel heats up as people get away for holiday weekend
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Global News
15 minutes ago
- Global News
Trump to sign ‘big, beautiful bill' into law. Here's what it includes
Republicans muscled U.S. President Donald Trump's tax and spending cut bill through the House on Thursday, the final step necessary to get the bill to his desk by the GOP's self-imposed deadline of July 4th. Trump is expected to sign the package into law Friday at the annual White House Fourth of July picnic. At nearly 900 pages, the legislation is a sprawling collection of tax breaks, spending cuts and other Republican priorities, including new money for national defense and deportations. Here's the latest on what's in the bill and when some of its provisions go into effect. Tax breaks for businesses and individuals Republicans say the bill is crucial because there would be a massive tax increase after December when tax breaks from Trump's first term expire. The legislation contains about $4.5 trillion in tax cuts. Story continues below advertisement The existing tax rates and brackets would become permanent under the bill, solidifying the tax cuts approved in Trump's first term. 1:19 'No better birthday present': Trump celebrates 'big, beautiful bill' passing ahead of July 4 It temporarily would add new tax deductions on tip, overtime and auto loans. There's also a $6,000 deduction for older adults who earn no more than $75,000 a year, a nod to his pledge to end taxes on Social Security benefits. It would boost the $2,000 child tax credit to $2,200. Millions of families at lower income levels would not get the full credit. A cap on state and local deductions, called SALT, would quadruple to $40,000 for five years. It's a provision important to New York and other high tax states, though the House wanted it to last for 10 years. There are scores of business-related tax cuts, including allowing businesses to immediately write off 100% of the cost of equipment and research. Proponents say this will boost economic growth. Story continues below advertisement The wealthiest households would see a $12,000 increase from the legislation, and the bill would cost the poorest people $1,600 a year, mainly due to reductions in Medicaid and food aid, according to the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office analysis of the House's version. Funds for border wall, deportations and 'Golden Dome' The bill would provide some $350 billion for Trump's border and national security agenda, including for the U.S.-Mexico border wall and for 100,000 migrant detention facility beds, as he aims to fulfill his promise of the largest mass deportation operation in U.S. history. Money would go for hiring 10,000 new Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers, with $10,000 signing bonuses and a surge of Border Patrol officers, as well. The goal is to deport some 1 million people per year. 0:22 Congress passes Trump's 'big, beautiful bill' To help pay for it, immigrants would face various new fees, including when seeking asylum protections. Story continues below advertisement For the Pentagon, the bill would provide billions for ship building, munitions systems, and quality of life measures for servicemen and women, as well as $25 billion for the development of the Golden Dome missile defense system. The Defense Department would have $1 billion for border security. Health care, food assistance face deep cuts to fund tax breaks and spending To help partly offset the lost tax revenue and new spending, Republicans aim to cut back on Medicaid and food assistance for people below the poverty line. Get breaking National news For news impacting Canada and around the world, sign up for breaking news alerts delivered directly to you when they happen. Sign up for breaking National newsletter Sign Up By providing your email address, you have read and agree to Global News' Terms and Conditions and Privacy Policy Republicans argue they are trying to rightsize the safety net programs for the population they were initially designed to serve, mainly pregnant women, the disabled 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 food stamps, including older people up to age 65. Parents of children 14 and older would have to meet the program's work requirements. Story continues below advertisement There's also a proposed new $35 co-payment that can be charged to patients using Medicaid services. More than 71 million people rely on Medicaid, which expanded under Obama's Affordable Care Act, and 40 million use the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program. Most already work, according to analysts. 4:55 'Taking our sweet time': Jeffries breaks speech record in bid to delay Trump's megabill vote The Congressional Budget Office estimates that 11.8 million more Americans would become uninsured by 2034 if the bill became law and 3 million more would not qualify for food stamps, also known as SNAP benefits. Republicans are looking to have states pick up some of the cost for SNAP benefits. Currently, the federal government funds all benefit costs. Under the bill, states beginning in 2028 will be required to contribute a set percentage of those costs if their payment error rate exceeds 6%. Payment errors include both underpayments and overpayments. Story continues below advertisement But the Senate bill temporarily delays the start date of that cost-sharing for states with the highest SNAP error rates. Alaska has the highest error rate in the nation at nearly 25%, according to Department of Agriculture data. Sen. Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska, had fought for the exception. She was a decisive vote in getting the bill through the Senate. Clean energy tax credits slashed Republicans are proposing to dramatically roll back tax breaks designed to boost clean energy projects fueled by renewable sources such as energy and wind. The tax breaks were a central component of President Joe Biden's 2022 landmark bill focused on addressing climate change and lowering health care costs. Democratic Oregon Sen. Ron Wyden went so far as to call the GOP provisions a 'death sentence for America's wind and solar industries and an inevitable hike in utility bills.' 4:09 Trump reverses California EV mandate, says 100% electric cars would be a 'disaster for the country' A tax break for people who buy new or used electric vehicles would expire on Sept. 30 of this year, instead of at the end of 2032 under current law. Story continues below advertisement Meanwhile, a tax credit for the production of critical materials will be expanded to include metallurgical coal used in steelmaking. 'Trump Accounts', a national hero garden and scrapped firearm taxes A number of extra provisions reflect other GOP priorities. The bill creates a new children's savings program, called Trump Accounts, with a potential $1,000 deposit from the Treasury. The Senate provided $40 million to establish Trump's long-sought 'National Garden of American Heroes.' There's a new excise tax on university endowments and a new tax on remittances, or transfers of money that people in the U.S. send abroad. The tax is equal to 1% of the transfer. A $200 tax on gun silencers and short-barreled rifles and shotguns was eliminated. One provision bars for one year Medicaid payments to family planning providers that provide abortions, namely Planned Parenthood. Story continues below advertisement 1:58 'Deal with the devil': AOC slams Trump's megabill in House speech Another section expands the Radiation Exposure Compensation Act, a hard-fought provision from GOP Sen. Josh Hawley of Missouri, for those impacted by nuclear development and testing. Billions would go for the Artemis moon mission and for the exploration of Mars, while $88 million is earmarked for a pandemic response accountability committee. Additionally, a provision would increase the nation's debt limit, by $5 trillion, to allow continued borrowing to pay already accrued bills. State AI regulation freeze cut from bill, rural hospital funding added The Senate overwhelmingly revolted against a proposal meant to deter states from regulating artificial intelligence. Republican governors across the country asked for the moratorium to be removed and the Senate voted to do so with a resounding 99-1 vote. Story continues below advertisement A provision was thrown in at the final hours that will provide $10 billion annually to rural hospitals for five years, or $50 billion in total. The Senate bill had originally provided $25 billion for the program, but that number was upped to win over holdout GOP senators and a coalition of House Republicans warning that reduced Medicaid provider taxes would hurt rural hospitals. The amended bill also stripped out a new tax on wind and solar projects that use a certain percentage of components from China. 1:59 Trump's 'Big, Beautiful Bill' passes U.S. Senate, but still faces hurdles Final price tag: bill could add US$3.3 trillion to deficit Altogether, the Congressional Budget Office projects that the bill would increase federal deficits over the next 10 years by nearly $3.3 trillion from 2025 to 2034. Story continues below advertisement Or not, depending on how one does the math. Senate Republicans are proposing a unique strategy of not counting the existing tax breaks as a new cost because those breaks are already 'current policy.' Republican senators say the Senate Budget Committee chairman has the authority to set the baseline for the preferred approach. Under the alternative Senate GOP view, the bill would reduce deficits by almost half a trillion dollars over the coming decade, the CBO said. Democrats say this is 'magic math' that obscures the true costs of the tax breaks. Some nonpartisan groups worried about the country's fiscal trajectory are siding with Democrats in that regard. The Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget says Senate Republicans were employing an 'accounting gimmick that would make Enron executives blush.'
San Francisco Chronicle
17 minutes ago
- San Francisco Chronicle
Trump is expected to sign his huge bill of tax and spending cuts at the White House July 4 picnic
WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump is expected to sign his package of tax breaks and spending cuts into law Friday after his cajoling produced almost unanimous Republican support in Congress for the domestic priority that could cement his second-term legacy. Against odds that at times seemed improbable, Trump achieved his goal of celebrating a historic — and divisive — legislative victory in time for the nation's birthday. Fighter jets and stealth bombers are to streak the sky over the annual White House Fourth of July picnic where Trump plans to sign the bill. The legislation, the president said, is 'going to make this country into a rocket ship. It's going to be really great.' Democrats assailed the package as a giveaway to the rich that will rob millions more lower-income people of their health insurance, food assistance and financial stability. "I never thought that I'd be on the House floor saying that this is a crime scene,' Democratic leader Hakeem Jeffries of New York said during a record-breaking speech that delayed the bill's passage by eight-plus hours. 'It's a crime scene, going after the health, and the safety, and the well-being of the American people.' The legislation extends Trump's 2017 multi-trillion dollar tax cuts and cuts Medicaid and food stamps by $1.2 trillion. It provides for a massive increase in immigration enforcement. Congress' nonpartisan scorekeeper projects that nearly 12 million more people will lose health insurance under the law. The legislation passed the House on a largely party-line vote Thursday, culminating a months-long push by the GOP to cram most of its legislative priorities into a single budget bill that could be enacted without Senate Democrats being able to block it indefinitely by filibustering. It passed by a single vote in the Senate, where North Carolina Republican Thom Tillis announced he would not run for reelection after incurring Trump's wrath in opposing it. Vice President JD Vance had to cast the tie-breaking vote. In the House, where two Republicans voted against it, one, conservative maverick Tom Massie of Kentucky, has also become a target of Trump's well-funded political operation. The legislation amounts to a repudiation of the agendas of the past two Democratic presidents, Barack Obama and Joe Biden, in rolling back Obama's Medicaid expansion under his signature health law and Biden's tax credits for renewable energy. The Congressional Budget Office estimates the package will add $3.3 trillion to the deficit over the decade and 11.8 million more people will go without health coverage. Trump exulted in his political victory Thursday night in Iowa, where he attended a kickoff of events celebrating the country's 250th birthday next year. 'I want to thank Republican congressmen and women, because what they did is incredible,' he said. The president complained that Democrats voted against the bill because 'they hate Trump — but I hate them, too.' The package is certain to be a flashpoint in next year's midterm elections, and Democrats are making ambitious plans for rallies, voter registration drives, attack ads, bus tours and even a multiday vigil, all intended to highlight the most controversial elements. Upon his return to Washington early Friday, Trump described the package as 'very popular,' though polling suggests that public opinion is mixed at best. For example, a Washington Post/Ipsos poll found that majorities of U.S. adults support increasing the annual child tax credit and eliminating taxes on earnings from tips, and about half support work requirements for some adults who receive Medicaid. But the poll found majorities oppose reducing federal funding for food assistance to low-income families and spending about $45 billion to build and maintain migrant detention centers. About 60% said it was 'unacceptable' that the bill is expected to increase the $36 trillion U.S. debt by more than $3 trillion over the next decade.
San Francisco Chronicle
17 minutes ago
- San Francisco Chronicle
LL Cool J says he won't perform at Philadelphia's July Fourth festival in support of workers strike
PHILADELPHIA (AP) — Rapper LL Cool J says he will not perform at a Fourth of July festival in Philadelphia in support of a strike by nearly 10,000 city workers in Philadelphia. The rapper and actor had been scheduled to appear at the Wawa Welcome America Festival on Friday, along with R&B singer and Philadelphia native Jazmine Sullivan and other performers. LL Cool J said in a video posted on social media that 'there's absolutely no way that I can perform, cross a picket line and pick up money when I know that people are out there fighting for a living wage.' 'I hope, I hope, I hope that, you know, the mayor and the city can make a deal. I hope it works out,' he said. LL Cool J also said that he never wants to disappoint his fans and that he plans to be in Philadelphia in case an agreement is reached. The festival comes as the strike moved into a fourth day Friday. Trash has been piling up in some areas and more than 30 Medical Examiner's Office staffers have been ordered back to work because of a growing backlog of bodies in storage. The latest talks between the city and leaders of District Council 33 — the largest of four major unions representing city workers — ended late Wednesday. Both sides have said they were willing to continue negotiations. The union represents many of the city's blue-collar workers, from trash collectors to clerks to security guards. Police and firefighters are not on strike. The city has offered a three-year contract with annual raises of about 3%, which the union said amounts to little more than $1,000 after taxes for members making $46,000 a year on average. Mayor Cherelle Parker has said the city has 'put its best offer on the table.' She stressed that the effective 13% pay hike over her four-year term -- including last year's 5% bump – along with a fifth step on the pay scale would be the best contract the union has seen in decades. Parker responded to LL Cool J's statement, saying that she spoke with him on Thursday. "I respect his decision, and understand his desire to see the city unified," the mayor said. 'He is always welcome in Philadelphia.' The union also responded, saying LL Cool J's support for municipal workers 'highlights his commitment to social justice and community well-being.' 'His support not only brings attention to our efforts but also inspires others to recognize and advocate for the rights and respect of all workers,' the union said. 'It's heartening to see public figures using their influence to champion causes that matter to everyday people.' On Thursday, Common Pleas Court Judge Sierra Thomas-Street approved the city's request to have the medical examiner's office staffers return to work because bodies have been piling up there in storage, posing a health and safety risk. Those workers include death and forensic investigators, forensic technicians and clerks. The order came a day after the judge ordered some emergency service dispatchers and essential water department employees back to work. Mounting trash piles in some parts of the city were also still causing grief for residents and officials, who have strongly urged residents to follow the collection guidelines imposed when the strike began Tuesday. They also urged residents to report problems at the trash collection sites, and noted trash is being cleared as fast as possible and the city is working to open more sites.
