House Majority Whip Tom Emmer isn’t concerned about the GOP megabill’s fate in the Senate, despite a raft of current policy disputes in need of speedy resolution. During an exclusive interview Thursday, the Minnesota Republican was bullish about getting the massive tax and spending package to President Donald Trump’s desk by July 4.
“The Senate will do their work. They’re going to send the bill back to us,” Emmer said. “We are going to pass it and send it to the president’s desk. The time for talking is over.”
There’s one area Emmer said he hopes the Senate won’t touch: the quadrupled state and local tax deduction cap carefully negotiated with blue-state Republicans in the House. Senate Finance Chair Mike Crapo recently said there’s little appetite among his members for keeping the increase fully intact. But Emmer said he believes the Senate understands the House’s more difficult math.
“John Thune was quoted somewhere as saying, you know, ‘We understand it’s 51 over here and it’s 218 over there.’” Emmer said. “That should tell you everything you need to know.”
Emmer also said he believes the Republican senators who have raised concerns on the House’s Medicaid overhaul proposals — specifically Sens. Susan Collins of Maine, Lisa Murkowski of Alaska and Josh Hawley of Missouri— are “going to be pleasantly surprised when they go through” the House-passed package.
“A lot of their concerns that they thought they were going to have are just not there,” Emmer insisted, adding that “there might be” tweaks from across the chamber to the House’s product, but no one has flagged any “major problems” in the bill. Emmer said the only area he thinks there might be unease is about the provider tax.
A key group of senators could also hold up the bill over the House’s moves to repeal or scale back the clean-energy tax credits that were created by the Democrats’ 2022 climate law. Disrupting the long-term availability of those credits could disrupt projects already underway in red districts and states. Emmer said House members are sensitive to this dynamic as well.
“That’s one of the reasons why the sunsetting [of certain credits] is out at least three years, so that people can continue projects and repurpose them,” said Emmer. “That was the whole concept. Whatever the Senate does with it, that’s their business.”
Emmer weighed in, too, on Speaker Mike Johnson’s suggestion that Republicans could pursue a second megabill through the filibuster-skirting, party-line budget reconciliation process — or even a third. The majority whip didn’t wave off the idea but emphasized that Congress should “get the first one done.”
“All of it’s possible,” Emmer said. “Is it probable? We’ll see.”
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