After a long night and day of back and forth, Republicans caved and the Republican budget bill has passed. Thank you to everyone who stayed with me through the late nights and nonstop updates. All the key details are below.
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Here’s the news:
House Republican Budget Bill:
Overnight, several of the holdouts preventing Speaker Mike Johnson from passing the Republican budget bill flipped, as they usually do, and paved the way for the budget bill to clear a procedural rules hurdle. Minutes ago, the budget bill passed the full House of Representatives with every Democrat voting against the legislation. The bill now heads to Donald Trump’s desk who is expected to sign the bill as soon as today.
Today, Hakeem Jeffries successfully delayed the vote on the budget bill for more than eight hours, setting a record for the longest floor speech in House history. Because of the Jeffries speech, the American people saw the vote happen in real time, and the vote did not happen at 5 am, like Johnson wanted.
I wanted to take a minute this morning to highlight the impacts of this budget bill for you:
Cuts to Medicaid and Other Programs
The bill will cut $930 billion from Medicaid, hundreds of billions of dollars from SNAP, and will let several Affordable Care Act subsidies expire.
The Congressional Budget Office estimates 11.8 million more people could lose health insurance by 2034. When you add in the Affordable Care Act cuts, more than 17 million Americans could lose health insurance.
Most Medicaid and SNAP cuts will not begin until 2027 and 2028, while work requirements for these social safety programs won’t begin until 2026.
Planned Parenthood stands to lose roughly $700m in federal funding as soon as this year.
Tax Cuts
The bill makes Trump’s 2017 tax cuts permanent and adds new deductions for tips, overtime, and interest on loans for U.S.-made cars. This will take effect this year.
It raises the SALT deduction cap from $10,000 to $40,000 for five years and includes about $4.5 trillion in total tax cuts.
Mass Deportations
The bill allocates $350 billion to border and security, including $46B for the wall and $45B for detention beds.
It funds 10,000 new ICE agents by 2029 as part of a mass deportation plan.
This bill will make ICE the largest law enforcement agency in the entire country, surpassing the manpower of the Bureau of Prisons.
Clean Energy Tax Cuts
The bill rolls back clean energy tax breaks from President Biden’s Inflation Reduction Act, including those for solar and wind.
The electric vehicle tax credit would expire in 2025 instead of 2032.
Child Tax Credit
Without the bill, the child tax credit will drop from $2,000 to $1,000 per child starting in 2026.
The Senate version would instead raise the credit to $2,200 per child.
Debt Limit
The legislation would raise the debt ceiling by $5 trillion. This exceeds the House-passed version, which allowed a $4 trillion increase.
The legislation will add $3.3 trillion to the national debt.
Who Benefits Most?
Yale University’s Budget Lab says wealthier taxpayers benefit the most from the bill.
Low-income Americans may see incomes drop by 2.5% due to safety net cuts, while high earners may see a 2.2% income increase.
Donald Trump is expected to sign this bill into law as soon as today ahead of the July 4th holiday weekend. He will likely host a large bill signing event at the White House although details remain scarce at this time.
A clinic in southwest Nebraska is closing due to financial challenges, including anticipated Medicaid cuts. Community Hospital, based in McCook, announced the closure of its Curtis clinic, which has served the town of about 900 for over 30 years. CEO Troy Bruntz cited the unsustainable financial environment caused by expected federal Medicaid cuts as the reason for shutting down services.
All Other News:
Kilmar Abrego Garcia filed a lawsuit in Maryland against the Trump Administration, detailing brutal treatment in El Salvador, including beatings, forced undressing, and head shaving before being frog-marched to a cell while assaulted with batons.
He alleges he lost 31 pounds in two weeks at CECOT due to malnutrition and abuse, was held in an overcrowded, windowless cell with no mattresses, and was forced to kneel all night, beaten if he collapsed, and denied bathroom access.
The new migrant detention center in the Everglades, dubbed "Alligator Alcatraz," experienced minor flooding just a day after opening.
Donald Trump visited the facility on Tuesday; after his departure, a storm dropped 1.5 inches of rain, according to the National Weather Service.
The first undocumented migrants have been sent there. Republicans are now selling merchandise to promote the facility. Meanwhile, some, including Laura Loomer who speaks to the President regularly, are calling for undocumented migrants to be fed to alligators.
American contractors guarding aid sites in Gaza have been using live ammunition, stun grenades, and pepper spray as desperate Palestinians rush for food, according to videos and eyewitness accounts obtained by the Associated Press.
Two anonymous U.S. contractors told the AP they were alarmed by what they described as reckless behavior by unqualified, heavily armed security personnel who appeared to act without oversight, with one recalling shots fired indiscriminately — including toward people — and stun grenades thrown regularly.
Mark Richards, a longtime music teacher at a Catholic school near New Orleans, says he was effectively fired for being listed as a man’s widower in an obituary, violating the school's morality clause banning same-sex relationships.
Refusing to stay silent, Richards said it's time for homophobic discrimination to stop, hoping his story empowers other LGBTQ+ educators to stand up and speak out.
See you this evening.
— Aaron
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