Senate Republicans are gearing up to make some “changes” to their version of the House of Representatives’ “big, beautiful, bill” before they try to pass it by Independence Day, multiple lawmakers said.
The reconciliation budget, which passed the House early Thursday morning in a 215-214-1 vote, will “undoubtedly” be the subject of multiple revisions before it makes it to the Senate floor, Sen. Thom Tillis (R-NC) stated, according to Politico.
“We have a lot of work that we need to do on the timeline and scope of the production and investment tax credits,” noted Tillis, a member of the Senate Finance Committee.
“There’s some changes that we want to make,” Sen. Markwayne Mullin (R-OK) told Axios in the publication’s “Hill Leaders” newsletter. “But we don’t want to change it so much that it doesn’t look the same.”
Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-AK), a staunch anti-Trumper, is surprisingly not advocating for dramatic edits to the bill, despite it being championed by the president.
“I don’t know about blowing things up… You can kind of see the writing on the wall here. You’ve got Republicans in the House that have been able to move something out,” Murkowski told Semafor. “You’ve got a Republican majority here, and you have a president who very clearly wants this to pass.”
Sen. Jerry Moran (R-KS) is reportedly one of four “key” senators pushing back against some of the cuts to the Inflation Reduction Act energy tax credits, with Axios noting that while he said he is still looking at the details, he said he “will look for some changes.”
Sen. Ron Johnson (R-WI) took a stronger stance against the House version of the budget, saying in a clip that aired Friday on MSNBC’s Morning Joe, that it is “unacceptable” as is.
Speaking with a reporter at the U.S. Capitol, Johnson said, “I couldn’t care less if he’s upset,” referring to President Donald Trump.
“I’m concerned about my children, my grandchildren, and the fact that we are stealing from them. We are stealing from our children and grandchildren,” the senator stated. “$37 trillion in debt, and we’re going to add to it as Republicans? That is unacceptable”
He added, “And that’s why there’s no way I’m going to vote for this bill in its current form.”
Johnson told Semafor that Sens. Rand Paul (R-KY), Rick Scott (R-FL), and Mike Lee (R-UT) are aligned with him on the issue.
While the GOP has control over the Senate, the party can only afford to lose three votes if they want to pass the bill.
Olivia Rondeau is a politics reporter for Breitbart News based in Washington, DC. Find her on X/Twitter and Instagram.
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