WASHINGTON ― Senate Republicans on Thursday held a marathon session of votes on a budget plan that would boost defense, border security and energy spending, kicking off President Donald Trump’s legislative agenda.
They pressed forward despite Trump’s endorsement a day earlier of a larger budget plan advanced by House Republicans that would also extend his 2017 tax cuts. The lower chamber’s approach, what Trump has referred to as “one big, beautiful bill,” calls for $4.5 trillion in tax cuts over 10 years, raises the debt ceiling by $4 trillion and calls for at least $1.5 trillion in spending cuts.
The debate over which approach to take ― passing it all in two halves, as preferred by Senate Republicans, or taking it on all at once, as favored by their counterparts in the House ― has consumed the party for months and stalled action on the president’s sweeping agenda.
Senate Republicans, in particular, are skeptical of the slim margins in the House and of GOP representatives’ ability to unify, especially with a rowdy band of conservatives and a group of moderates making competing demands. The cost of the House proposal is expected to be offset with major spending cuts ― including to Medicaid, a program Trump suggested this week he wouldn’t touch.
“We’re not sure they can do it,” Sen. Mike Rounds (R-S.D.) told HuffPost of the House. “If they can’t get it done, we’re way ahead of getting the first of two bills done.”
But other Republicans said they were confused by the overall strategy, given Trump’s preference for the House approach.
“It just seems a little bizarre to me. I can’t quite figure it out,” Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) told reporters on Wednesday. “I’m a little baffled as to what we’re doing.”
Thursday’s session in the Senate, known as a “vote-a-rama,” is expected to last all night and go into Friday morning. Senators can force an unlimited number of votes as part of a particular budget process, known as reconciliation, which Republicans plan to use to bypass a Democratic filibuster.
Republicans rejected several attempts by Democrats to amend the budget proposal with provisions that would bar the enactment of tax cuts for millionaires and billionaires. There’s no reason to vote on taxes at all, the Republican senators argued, since this bill only covers spending for defense, border security and energy development. A tax bill will come later.
But Democrats viewed the vote session Thursday as an opportunity to make Republicans take tough votes on issues like taxes, the Trump administration’s federal funding freeze, and his and billionaire Elon Musk’s efforts to shutter government agencies.
The goal, Democratic leaders told HuffPost, is to put Republicans on the defensive and damage the party’s political standing ahead of the 2026 midterm elections.
“No billionaire should get yet another tax break,” Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) said Thursday after he introduced his amendment aiming to prevent tax cuts for the wealthy. “I ask my Republican colleagues, yes or no? Do you believe billionaires should get another tax break or not?”
