Sweeping Trump tax bill clears key hurdle with US house Republicans
Speaker of the house Mike Johnson has little room for error on the floor, as a handful of Republican 'no' votes could scuttle the bill. (AP pic)
WASHINGTON : US President Donald Trump's massive tax and spending bill cleared an important procedural hurdle in the Republican-controlled house of representatives yesterday, when a gatekeeper committee approved the measure and set up a floor vote for passage to occur within hours.
Republicans have been deeply divided over the bill, which would extend Trump's signature 2017 tax cuts, create new breaks for tipped income and auto loans, end many green-energy subsidies and boost spending on the military and immigration enforcement.
It would pay for those changes by tightening eligibility for food and health programmes that serve millions of low-income Americans.
The nonpartisan congressional budget office estimates the bill will add US$3.8 trillion to the US's US$36.2 trillion in debt over the next decade.
The house rules committee voted 8-4 to advance the bill late yesterday after a marathon session that lasted nearly 22 hours.
Republican leaders later scheduled two votes, one to begin debate and a second to pass the bill, before sunrise on Thursday.
House passage would set the stage for weeks of debate in the Republican-led Senate.
A handful of party hardliners, angry that the bill did not contain more spending cuts, met with Trump and house speaker Mike Johnson yesterday, a day after Trump's visit to the Capitol failed to unify the narrow 220-212 majority.
Johnson expressed confidence that the bill would pass the house.
'I believe we are going to land this airplane,' he told reporters.
Revisions
Representative Dusty Johnson, who leads the chamber's Main Street caucus, said he believed the speaker had reached a deal that could pass the house.
'The speaker has been working with a broad cross section of the conference,' he told reporters. 'We have every expectation, the speaker has every expectation, that we will get there.'
Credit rating firm Moody's last week stripped the US government of its top-tier credit rating, citing the nation's growing debt. US stocks fell on Wednesday amid investor concern about the mounting debt.
The Medicaid health programme for low-income households had proved to be a major sticking point, with fiscal hawks pushing for cuts to partly offset the cost of the bill's tax components, which moderate Republicans say would hurt voters whose support they will need in the 2026 midterm congressional elections.
The rules committee approved an overall amendment package containing deals between Johnson and various Republican factions.
The revisions included imposing work requirements for the Medicaid programme at the end of 2026, two years earlier than previously planned.
It also penalised states that expand Medicaid in the future and raised the amount of state and local taxes that can be deducted from federal income taxes.
The amendment package also exempted firearm silencers from registration requirements under the National Firearms Act and eliminated a US$200 tax on the firearm accessories, changes demanded by representative Andrew Clyde of Georgia.
Democrats railed against the legislation.
'Republicans are kicking millions of Americans off their healthcare and (food) benefits in order to finance tax cuts that will help billionaires,' said representative Jim McGovern, the top Democrat on the house rules committee.
'Cutting benefits means families will go hungry, farmers will suffer and health care costs will go up,' he said.
Trump visited Republican lawmakers at the Capitol on Tuesday to try to persuade holdouts to get in line on what he calls a 'big, beautiful bill.'
Little wiggle room
Johnson has little room for error on the house floor, as a handful of Republican 'no' votes could scuttle the bill.
Republican lawmakers have said they do not believe the nonpartisan analysts' projections and accused Moody's of deliberately timing its downgrade last Friday to try to block the bill's passage.
Lawmakers must act to address the debt limit by this summer or risk triggering a devastating default.
'Deficits aside, this bill is ugly because it is ultimately a betrayal of the contract that we have made with the American people, and especially to our babies and to our working people,' said Democratic representative Gwen Moore.
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