The Senate voted largely along party lines early Saturday morning to pass a budget blueprint encompassing many of President Donald Trump’s legislative priorities, including a permanent extension of the president’s 2017 tax cuts and $175 billion in new spending on border security.
Senators voted 51 to 48 to advance the Trump-backed budget resolution to the House for consideration with Republican Sens. Rand Paul of Kentucky and Susan Collins of Maine joining with Senate Democrats to oppose the fiscal framework. The budget blueprint’s passage at roughly 2:30 a.m. came after a marathon series of votes known as a “vote-a-rama” during which Senate Democrats forced their Republican colleagues to take politically contentious votes on amendments related to entitlement program spending, Department of Government Efficiency actions and Trump’s tariffs.
Senate Republicans countered that the forthcoming tax and spending bill that would be unlocked with passage of the budget resolution by both chambers would not cut Americans’ Medicaid or Medicare benefits. Congressional Republicans are seeking to enact Trump’s legislative agenda through a process known as budget reconciliation, which allows Senate Republicans to bypass the filibuster and advance legislation by a simple majority vote.
“The argument is going to be made that we’re going to hurt all kinds of different people tonight in different ways,” Republican Idaho Sen. Mike Crapo said on the Senate floor Friday evening. “But the reality is that’s not going to happen. The President has been very clear any reforms to Medicare or Medicaid must not reduce patient benefits.”
No amendment offered by Senate Democrats was notably related to border security or helping fast-track the president’s deportation agenda.
Paul voted against the budget resolution, citing the blueprint’s inclusion of a $5 trillion increase in the statutory debt limit, which the Kentucky Republican argued would set a record for borrowing more money during one bill at any recent point in American history.
“If we expand the debt at $5 trillion that will be an expansion of the debt equal to or exceeding everything that happened in the Biden years,” Paul said on the Senate floor Friday. “Republicans who vote for this will be on record as being more fiscally liberal than their counterparts. They will vote to borrow more money than the Democrats have ever borrowed.”
The nonpartisan Committee for a Responsible Budget found that the Senate’s blueprint will add up to $5.8 trillion to the deficit, which the organization argued would be “historically unprecedented in its fiscal irresponsibility.”
Senate GOP leadership has argued that the low spending reduction floors in the bill give the upper chamber maximum flexibility to ensure compliance with the budget reconciliation process.
Some deficit-concerned House GOP lawmakers are not convinced senators are serious about cutting spending, suggesting they will oppose the budget resolution barring changes to the text.
“If the Senate can deliver real deficit reduction in line with or greater than the House goals, I can support the Senate budget resolution,” House Freedom Caucus Chairman Andy Harris said in a statement Saturday. “However, by the Senate setting committee instructions so low at $4 billion compared to the House’s $1.5 to $2 trillion, I am unconvinced that will happen. The Senate is free to put pen to paper to draft its reconciliation bill, but I can’t support House passage of the Senate changes to our budget resolution until I see the actual spending and deficit reduction plans to enact President Trump’s America First agenda.”
“The Senate response was unserious and disappointing, creating $5.8 trillion in new costs and a mere $4 billion in enforceable cuts, less than one day’s worth of borrowing by the federal government,” House Budget Committee Chairman Jodey Arrington said in a statement Saturday morning.
The initial House budget resolution did not allow for permanent tax relief, which is a nonstarter for most Senate Republicans and the president.
Senate Republicans included a permanent extension of Trump’s 2017 tax cuts in the fiscal framework by using a budget scoring approach that assumes a permanent extension has a deficit neutral impact because the forthcoming bill would just be continuing current policies.
“Americans should not have to live in fear of a tax hike every few years,” Thune said in a speech on the floor Thursday.
Arrington appeared to slam the budget resolution’s scoring approach Saturday morning for including the current-policy baseline without commensurate spending reductions.
“It also sets a dangerous precedent by direct scoring tax policy without including enforceable offsets,” Arrington said.
Trump has notably endorsed the Senate budget resolution, adding pressure on House lawmakers to support the blueprint when they return to Washington.
“Every Republican, House and Senate, must UNIFY,” Trump wrote on Truth Social Wednesday. “We need to pass it IMMEDIATELY!
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