WASHINGTON (Reuters) -Republicans in the U.S. Congress advanced elements of President Donald Trump’s sweeping budget package on Wednesday after an all-night debate, as a key committee voted to approve tax cuts that would add trillions of dollars to the U.S. debt.
The party line vote by the tax-writing House of Representatives Ways and Means Committee amounts to an initial victory for Republicans, who still have many hurdles to clear before they can get the sprawling package of tax cuts, spending hikes and safety-net reductions to Trump’s desk to sign into law.
Trump’s “Big Beautiful Bill” would add trillions of dollars to the nation’s debt load, which at $36.2 trillion now equals 127% of GDP. The package calls for $4 trillion in additional borrowing, though the total cost is uncertain at this point.
House of Representatives Speaker Mike Johnson, a Republican, told reporters his party was still on track to pass the massive legislation before the May 26 Memorial Day holiday. But he still faced dissent from within his own party.
Moderate Republican lawmakers from Democratic-led coastal states including New York, New Jersey and California — critical to the party’s narrow 220-213 majority — say the bill imposes too low a limit on how much state and local taxes can be deducted from constituents’ federal income taxes.
“As this stands right now, I am a ‘no,’ and so they’re going to need to come up with a solution here and quickly if they want to stay on the schedule,” said Republican Representative Mike Lawler of New York and an advocate of the so-called SALT deduction.
Party hardliners, meanwhile, are demanding deeper spending cuts.
“I’m trying to get the math in order to get this country back on track, financially. And it just hasn’t happened,” said hardline Republican Ralph Norman of South Carolina.
The Ways and Means Committee vote came after an all-night debate that saw at least one lawmaker fall asleep at his post. Republicans rejected a series of proposed changes by opposition Democrats, who blasted the bill as a wasteful giveaway to the wealthy that would shred health and food benefits for the poor and worsen the nation’s financial standing.
A separate House committee was still debating a Republican proposal to tighten eligibility for the Medicaid health plan, which covers 71 million low-income Americans, with a vote expected later in the day.
PLANNED PARENTHOOD FOCUS
The House Energy and Commerce Committee spent much of early Wednesday debating abortion and a provision of the Republican legislation aimed at prohibiting Medicaid funding for Planned Parenthood, a healthcare provider mainly for low-income women that provides abortion services in states where it is legal.
Federal funding for abortions already is prohibited and Democratic Representative Lizzie Fletcher of Texas argued that the bill would stop Medicaid funding even in states where abortion is illegal and Planned Parenthood doctors are providing essential services, such as cancer screenings and pregnancy visits.
Republicans defeated the amendment on a partisan 28-24 vote.
That committee’s Medicaid plan would save the federal government $715 billion and kick 7.7 million people off the program, according to the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office.
A third panel was due to resume debate on a proposal to require some people who receive SNAP food benefits to get a job and shift some costs to states.
It would extend tax cuts passed in Trump’s first term that are due to expire at the end of the year, and add new tax breaks for workers, retirees and private schools. To offset some of the cost, the package would cancel green-energy programs passed under Democratic President Joe Biden.
The country’s looming debt ceiling deadline this summer is also pushing Republicans to work fast. The package would raise the debt limit by $4 trillion and Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent has urged lawmakers to act by mid-July to avoid a default that would upend the global economy.
(Writing by Andy Sullivan and Richard Cowan; Editing by Scott Malone and Daniel Wallis)
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