Trump's 'Big, Beautiful Bill' squeaks through House

WASHINGTON (CN) — President Donald Trump was on track Thursday to get his wish for a sweeping budget reconciliation package on his desk in time for Independence Day after the House finally passed the legislation, which has been held up as the flagship of his second administration.

But it was a pyrrhic victory for Trump and Republicans, who slogged through a week of party infighting and Democratic obstruction in both chambers to get the president’s so-called “Big, Beautiful Bill” across the finish line.

In a narrow 218-214 vote, the House approved the nearly 1,000-page budget reconciliation legislation passed by the Senate earlier this week. The bill represents the central pillars of the White House’s policy agenda — if made law, the measure would extend Trump’s 2017 tax cuts and infuse billions of dollars into border security measures, which would supercharge the president’s mass deportation campaign.

Just two Republicans, Kentucky Representative Thomas Massie and Pennsylvania Representative Brian Fitzpatrick, voted against the bill.

That result alone was an uphill battle in the lower chamber. The House was in session overnight Wednesday into Thursday as Republican leadership attempted to flip a group of GOP holdouts who were blocking a procedural vote on the budget reconciliation package. Some Republican lawmakers were furious that the Senate version of the measure was projected to balloon the national debt by more than $1 trillion despite efforts to cut spending.

Thanks in part to pressure from the president, who throughout the night raged on social media over the holdup, nearly all of the Republican critics of the megabill had relented by early Thursday morning. It’s unclear what, if anything, the holdouts got in return for getting on board with the legislation.

But House Republicans had another problem when the sun rose on Washington on Thursday morning: House Democrats, who leveraged congressional procedure to hold the chamber floor for hours ahead of a final vote on the Big, Beautiful Bill.

House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, using a privilege reserved for party leadership, spoke for more than eight and a half hours in a proto-filibuster and slammed his Republican colleagues for the sweeping legislation, which he described as a “crime scene” for the American people.

Democrats have long pointed out that the budget reconciliation package pays for some of its provisions by cutting government aid programs, including Medicaid and the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program. Experts have forecast that as many as 17 million people could lose health care coverage because of the megabill.

“As we prepare to take this consequential vote, I urge many of my colleagues in government, my colleagues on the other side of the aisle … we don’t work for President Trump,” Jeffries said. “We don’t work for [Vice President] JD Vance. We don’t work for Elon Musk. I hope my Republican colleagues will come to the conclusion that we work for the American people.”

The Democratic leader’s floor speech broke the record for the longest in House history, edging out a similar filibuster delivered by former House Speaker Kevin McCarthy in 2021 as he opposed the Joe Biden administration’s Build Back Better Act.

Jeffries’ marathon speech was predictably panned by House Republicans, who framed the effort as showmanship.

“Democrats are focused on performing,” House Speaker Mike Johnson wrote in a post on X as the Democratic leader spoke. “Republicans are focused on delivering. Time to pass the One Big Beautiful Bill!”

Republicans have contended that the budget reconciliation package will spare Americans from a tax increase by inking the cuts from Trump’s first term. And they’ve posed the legislation as crucial to supporting the White House’s goal of an immigration crackdown.

“The Big Beautiful Bill gives the president the resources and the power to undo the Biden border invasion,” Vance said on X Wednesday night. “It must pass.”

The budget reconciliation bill’s narrow victory in the House draws to a close a painful week on Capitol Hill, which also saw the Senate remain in session overnight as Republicans struggled to corral the support they needed to clear the measure out of the upper chamber.

Alaska Senator Lisa Murkowski, who had been skeptical of the measure, was eventually convinced to support it after securing several carve-outs for her home state, including a hike in federal funding for rural hospitals. Despite that, the Alaska Republican told reporters this week that she hoped the House would return the measure to the Senate, saying that “we’re not there yet.”

Even with Murkowski’s support, the ”Big, Beautiful Bill” found itself deadlocked in a 50-50 Senate, forcing Vance to step in and break the tie. Several Republican lawmakers, including Maine Senator Susan Collins, North Carolina Senator Thom Tillis and Kentucky Senator Rand Paul, refused to back the measure.

Beyond expanding Trump’s tax cuts and funding border security measures, the “Big, Beautiful Bill” also raises the federal debt ceiling, sidestepping a fiscal deadline set for August. The legislation also authorizes additional defense spending and takes steps to follow through on the president’s campaign promise to eliminate taxes on tips and overtime wages — though those provisions are limited.

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