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BreakingNews.ie
22-05-2025
- Business
- BreakingNews.ie
House Republicans pass Trump's big bill of tax breaks after all-night session
House Republicans stayed up all night to pass their multitrillion-dollar tax breaks package, with speaker Mike Johnson defying the sceptics and unifying his ranks to muscle US President Donald Trump's priority bill to approval. With last-minute concessions and stark warnings from Mr Trump, the Republican holdouts largely dropped their opposition to salvage the 'One Big Beautiful Bill' that is central to the Republican agenda. Advertisement The House launched a debate before midnight and by sunrise on Thursday the vote was called, 215-214, with Democrats staunchly opposed. Speaker of the House Mike Johnson speaks during a news conference at the US Capitol (Rod Lamkey/AP) It next goes to the Senate. 'To put it simply, this bill gets Americans back to winning again,' said Mr Johnson just before the vote. The outcome caps an intense time on Capitol Hill, with days of private negotiations and public committee hearings, many happening back-to-back, around-the-clock. Advertisement Republicans insisted their sprawling 1,000-page-plus package was what voters sent them to Congress — and Trump to the White House — to accomplish. They believe it will be 'rocket fuel', as one put it during the debate, for the uneasy US economy. Mr Trump himself demanded action, visiting House Republicans at Tuesday's conference meeting and hosting Republican leaders and the holdouts for a lengthy session on Wednesday at the White House. Before the vote, the administration warned in a pointed statement that 'failure to pass this bill would be the ultimate betrayal'. Advertisement Central to the package is the Republicans' commitment to extending some 4.5 trillion dollars in tax breaks they engineered during Mr Trump's first term in 2017, while adding new ones he campaigned on during his 2024 campaign, including no taxes on tips, overtime pay, car loan interest and others. To make up for some of the lost tax revenue, the Republicans focused on changes to Medicaid and the food stamps programme, largely by imposing work requirements on many of those receiving benefits. There is also a massive rollback of green energy tax breaks from the Biden-era Inflation Reduction Act. Additionally, the package tacks on 350 billion dollars in new spending, with about 150 billion dollars going to the Pentagon, including for the president's new 'Golden Dome' defence shield, and the rest for Mr Trump's mass deportation and border security agenda. Advertisement All told, the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office estimates 8.6 million fewer people would have health care coverage and three million less people a month would have SNAP food stamps benefits with the proposed changes. The CBO said the tax provisions would increase federal deficits by 3.8 trillion dollars over the decade, while the changes to Medicaid, food stamps and other services would tally one trillion dollars in reduced spending. The lowest-income households in the US would see their resources drop, while the highest ones would see a boost, it said. House Democratic leader Hakeem Jeffries of New York read letters from Americans describing the way the programme cuts would hurt them. Advertisement 'This is one big ugly bill,' he said. As the minority, without the votes to stop Mr Trump's package, Democrats instead offered up impassioned speeches and procedural moves to stall its advance. As soon as the House floor reopened for debate, the Democrats forced a vote to adjourn. It failed. The bill was passed following stark warnings from US President Donald Trump (Julia Demaree Nikhinson/AP) In 'the dark of night they want to pass this GOP tax scam,' said representative Pete Aguilar. Other Democrats called it a 'big, bad bill' or a 'big, broken promise'. Late in the night, Republican leaders unveiled a 42-page amendment with a number of revisions. The changes included speedier implementation of the Medicaid work requirements, which will begin in December 2026, rather than January 2029, and a faster roll back of the production tax credits for clean electricity projects, both sought by conservatives. And in a nod to Mr Trump's influence, the Republicans renamed a proposed new children's savings programme after the president, changing it from Maga accounts — money account for growth and advancement — to simply 'Trump' accounts. Representative Erin Houchin said Americans should not believe the dire predictions from Democrats about the impact of the bill. 'We can unlock the 'Golden Age' of America,' she said, echoing the president's own words. Final analysis of the overall package's costs and economic impacts are still being assessed.
Fox News
14-05-2025
- Business
- Fox News
House Republicans face down Dem attacks, protests to pull all-nighter on Trump's 'big, beautiful bill'
Three key committees in the process of putting together President Donald Trump's "one big, beautiful bill" are expected to work through the night to advance their respective portions of the Republican agenda. The House Agriculture Committee, the Energy & Commerce Committee and the Ways & Means Committee are all holding meetings aimed at advancing key parts of Trump's bill. Sources told Fox News Digital they expected the Energy & Commerce and Ways & Means meetings, which began on Tuesday afternoon, to last upwards of 20 hours each. The Agriculture panel's markup is also expected to last into Wednesday. Democrats on each committee, meanwhile, have prepared a barrage of attacks and accusations against GOP lawmakers looking to gut critical welfare programs. Sparks flew early at the Energy & Commerce Committee meeting with protesters both inside and outside the room repeatedly attempting to disrupt proceedings – with 26 people arrested by Capitol Police. Protesters against Medicaid cuts, predominately in wheelchairs, remained outside the budget markup for several hours as representatives inside debated that and other critical facets under the committee's broad jurisdiction. Inside the budget markup, Democrats and Republicans sparred along party lines over Medicaid cuts. Democrats repeatedly claimed the Republican budget proposal will cut vital Medicaid services. Many Democrats shared how Medicaid services have saved their constituents' lives and argued that millions of Americans could lose coverage under the current proposal. Meanwhile, Republicans accused Democrats of lying to the American people about Medicaid cuts – a word Kentucky Republican Rep. Brett Guthrie, Chairman of the Energy and Commerce Committee, deterred his colleagues from using. Tensions arose when the word was repeated as Democrats called it a mischaracterization of their testimonies. Republicans have contended that their bill only seeks to cut waste, fraud, and abuse of the Medicaid system, leaving more of its resources for vulnerable populations that truly need it. That committee was tasked with finding $880 billion in spending cuts to offset Trump's other funding priorities. Guthrie told House Republicans on a call Sunday night that they'd found upwards of $900 billion in cuts. Democrats have seized on Republican reforms to Medicaid, including heightened work requirements and shifting more costs to certain states, as a political cudgel. At one point late in the evening, House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y., made an appearance at the Energy & Commerce panel's meeting. "I just want to mention our Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries is here because of his concern about Medicaid. Thank you," the committee's top Democrat, Rep. Frank Pallone, D-N.J., said. But tensions remain between moderate Republicans and conservatives about the level of cuts the committee is seeking to the former Biden administration's Inflation Reduction Act green energy tax subsidies. The meeting at the Ways & Means Committee, the House's tax-writing panel, had relatively little fanfare but was equally contentious as Democrats attempted to offer amendments to preserve Affordable Care Act tax credits and changes to the state and local tax (SALT) deduction cap. At one point, Reps. Beth Van Duyne, R-Texas, and Tom Suozzi, D-N.Y., got into a heated exchange over SALT, with Suozzi pushing Van Duyne on whether she'd ever been to New York. Van Duyne earlier called Texas a "donor state" in terms of taxes, arguing, "We should not have to pay to make up for the rich folks in New York who are getting raped by their local and state governments." Suozzi later pointed out Van Duyne was born and went to college in upstate New York – leading to audible gasps in the room. Van Duyne said there was "a reason" she left. "We're sorry you left New York, but in some ways it may have worked out better for all of us," Suozzi said. The SALT deduction cap, however, is still a politically tricky issue even as House lawmakers debate what Republicans hoped would be the final bill. The legislation would raise the $10,000 SALT deduction cap to $30,000 for most single and married tax filers – a figure that Republicans in higher cost-of-living areas said was not enough. Rep. Mike Lawler, R-N.Y., threatened to vote against the final bill if the new cap remains. As the committee's marathon meeting continued, a group of blue state Republicans are huddling with House GOP leaders to find a compromise on a way forward. Rep. Nick LaLota, R-N.Y., hinted at tensions in the meeting when he posted on X that Rep. Nicole Malliotakis, R-N.Y., a member of the SALT Caucus and Ways & Means Committee, "wasn't involved in today's meeting" because her district required "something different than mine and the other most SALTY five." Malliotakis had told Fox News Digital she was supportive of the $30,000 cap. She's also the only member of the SALT Caucus on the critical tax-writing panel. The Agriculture Committee, which began its meeting on Tuesday evening, saw Democrats waste no time in accusing Republicans of trying to gut the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), colloquially known as food stamps. Rep. Adam Gray, D-Calif., accused Republicans of worrying that "somebody is getting a meal they didn't deserve or kids are getting too fat" instead of more critical issues. Republicans, like Rep. Randy Feenstra, R-Iowa, touted the bill's inclusion of crop insurance for young farmers, increasing opportunity for export markets, and helping invest in national animal disaster centers aimed at preventing and mitigating livestock illness. He also said Republicans were working to "secure" SNAP from waste and abuse. House and Senate Republicans are working on Trump's agenda via the budget reconciliation process, which allows the party in power to sideline the minority by lowering the Senate's threshold for passage to a simple majority, provided the legislation at hand deals with spending, taxes or the national debt. Trump wants Republicans to use the maneuver for a sweeping bill on his tax, border, immigration, energy and defense priorities. Two sources familiar with the plan said the House Budget Committee intends to advance the full bill, the first step to getting the legislation to a House-wide vote, on Friday.
