‘Make The Changes They Want’: Trump Gives Senate Go-Ahead To Take Red Pen To ‘Big, Beautiful Bill’

President Donald Trump gave Senate Republicans permission to make major changes to the House-passed “one big, beautiful bill” Sunday evening, throwing a wrench in Speaker Mike Johnson’s efforts to persuade his upper chamber colleagues to refrain from significantly rewriting the legislation.

Trump’s approval of Senate Republicans making “the changes they want” in the sweeping tax and spending bill comes as some GOP senators are warning that the package is dead-on-arrival without major reforms. Johnson has been urging the Senate to alter the legislation as little as possible given the “delicate” consensus House GOP leadership crafted on the president’s landmark bill, which passed the House by a narrow one-vote margin Thursday.

“I want the Senate and the senators to make the changes they want,” Trump told reporters Sunday evening. “It will go back to the House and we’ll see if we can get them. In some cases, the changes may be something I’d agree with, to be honest.”

“We’ve had a very good response from the Senate and I don’t know how Democrats can’t vote for it,” Trump continued. “I think they are going to have changes. Some will be minor, some will be fairly significant.”

Congressional Republicans are moving quickly to meet the White House’s July 4 deadline to pass Trump’s domestic policy agenda in the budget reconciliation bill. Assuming the Senate modifies the House-passed legislation, House Republicans will have to vote on the bill for a second time before sending the package to the president’s desk.

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent told