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Republicans scramble to save Trump’s 'big, beautiful bill'

9 47
27.06.2025

Senate Republicans are scrambling to resurrect President Trump’s “big, beautiful bill,” which stalled Thursday after Parliamentarian Elizabeth MacDonough rejected one of its biggest cost-cutting provisions.

The chamber’s referee ruled the Senate’s proposed cap on health care provider taxes violated the Byrd Rule, which governs what legislation can pass with a simple-majority and avoid a filibuster under budget reconciliation rules. The provision would cut hundreds of billions of dollars in federal Medicaid spending.

Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.) told reporters his leadership team has “contingency plans” to keep the bill moving forward, even though the key piece may now fall out of the bill.

“We have contingency plans, plan B, plan C,” he said as he walked into a Republican lunch meeting.

Losing the Senate’s proposal to deeply cut on federal Medicaid payments means Republican leaders will need to come up with hundreds of billions in new savings to pay for the cost of making several corporate tax cuts permanent.

The surprise decision, which was announced Thursday, has Republican senators scrambling for a way to pass the legislation by the July 4 deadline set by Trump.

“We have no idea what’s going to happen here, we got to work on some kind of a fix,” said Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.). “Hopefully their fix will involve protecting rural hospitals.”

Hawley was one of several GOP senators, including Sens. Susan Collins (R-Maine),........

© The Hill