06/30/2025
SENATE DEBATE ON BUDGET SLASHING BILL THAT COULD AFFECT MANY EASTERN KENTUCKY RESIDENTS MAY GO ALL NIGHT
Debate is underway in the Senate for an all-night session tonight (Sunday), with Republicans wrestling President Donald Trump's “Big Beautiful Bill” of tax breaks and spending cuts over mounting Democratic opposition — and even some brake-pumping over the budget slashing by the president himself.
The outcome from the weekend of work in the Senate remains uncertain and highly volatile. GOP leaders are rushing to meet Trump's Fourth of July deadline to pass the package, but they barely secured enough support to muscle it past a procedural hurdle in a tense scene the day before. A handful of Republican holdouts revolted, and it took phone calls from Trump and a visit from Vice President JD Vance to keep it on track.
If approved, the bill could affect many of the 10,046 Letcher County residents now participating in the Medicaid program, and an additional 5,031 Letcher families participating in the nation’s food stamp program, officially known as the Supplemental Nutritional Assistance Program (SNAP).
In addition, a nonpartisan health organization says the bill could force at least 35 rural hospitals in Kentucky, including the ARH hospitals in Whitesburg and Harlan, to close if the bill passes in its present form. U.S. Rep. Harold “Hal” Rogers, who supports the bill, says the finding by the Cecil G. Sheps Center for Health Services Research is wrong when it says the bill will result in the closing of the hospitals.
Meanwhile, GOP Sen. Thom Tillis of North Carolina announced Sunday he would not seek reelection after Trump badgered him for saying he could not vote for the bill with its steep Medicaid cuts. A new analysis from the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office found that 11.8 million more Americans would become uninsured by 2034 if the bill became law. It also said the package would increase the deficit by nearly $3.3 trillion over the decade.
But other Senate Republicans, along with conservatives in the House, are pushing for steeper cuts, particularly to health care, drawing their own unexpected warning from Trump.
"Don't go too crazy!" the president posted on social media. "REMEMBER, you still have to get reelected."
All told, the Senate bill includes some $4 trillion in tax cuts, making permanent Trump's 2017 rates, which would expire at the end of the year if Congress fails to act, while adding the new ones he campaigned on, including no taxes on tips.
The Senate package would roll back billions in green energy tax credits that Democrats warn will wipe out wind and solar investments nationwide, and impose $1.2 trillion in cuts, largely to Medicaid and food stamps, by imposing work requirements and making sign-up eligibility more stringent.
Additionally, the bill would provide a $350 billion infusion for border and national security, including for deportations, some of it paid for with new fees charged to immigrants.
If the Senate can push through overnight voting and pass the bill, it would need to return to the House. Speaker Mike Johnson has told lawmakers to be on call for a return to Washington this coming week.
DEMOCRATS PLEDGE TO FIGHT ALL NIGHT
Unable to stop the march toward passage of the 940-page bill, the Democrats as the minority party in Congress is using the tools at its disposal to delay and drag out the process.
Democrats forced a full reading of the text, which took some 16 hours. Then senators took over the debate, filling the chamber with speeches, while Republicans largely stood aside.
"Reckless and irresponsible," said Sen. Gary Peters of Michigan. "A gift to the billionaire class," said Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont.
Sen. Patty Murray, the ranking Democrat on the Appropriations Committee, raised particular concern about the accounting method being used by the Republicans, which says the tax breaks from Trump's first term are now "current policy" and the cost of extending them should not be counted toward deficits.
"In my 33 years here in the United States Senate, things have never — never — worked this way," said Murray, the longest-serving Democrat on the Budget Committee.
She said that kind of "magic math" won't fly with Americans trying to balance their own household books.
"Go back home and try that game with your constituents," she said. "We still need to kick people off their health care — that's too expensive. We still need to close those hospitals — we have to cut costs. And we still have to kick people off SNAP — because the debt is out of control."
Sanders said Tillis' decision not to seek reelection shows the hold that Trump's cult of personality has over the GOP.
"We are literally taking food out of the mouths of hungry kids," Sanders said, while giving tax breaks to Jeff Bezos and other wealthy billionaires.
GOP LEADERS UNPHASED
Republicans are using their majorities to push aside Democratic opposition, and appeared undeterred, even as they have run into a series of political and policy setbacks.
"We're going to pass the 'Big, beautiful bill," said Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., the Budget Committee chairman.
The holdout Republicans remain reluctant to give their votes, and their leaders have almost no room to spare, given their narrow majorities. Essentially, they can afford three dissenters in the Senate, with its 53-47 GOP edge, and about as many in the House, if all members are present and voting.
Trump, who has at times allowed wiggle room on his deadline, kept the pressure on lawmakers to finish.
He threatened to campaign aginst Tillis, who was worried that Medicaid cuts would leave many without health care in his state. Trump badgered Tillis again on Sunday morning, saying the senator "has hurt the great people of North Carolina."
Later Sunday, Tillis issued a lengthy statement announcing he would not seek reelection in 2026.
In an impassioned evening speech, Tillis shared his views arguing the Senate approach is a betrayal of Trump's promise not to kick people off health care.
"We could take the time to get this right," he thundered. But until then, he said he would remain opposed.
DEMOCRATS CAN'T FILIBUSTER, BUT CAN STALL
Using a congressional process called budget reconciliation, the Republicans can muscle the bill through on a simple majority vote in the Senate, rather than the typical 60-vote threshold needed to overcome objections.
Without the filibuster, Democrats have latched on to other tools to mount their objections.
One is the full reading of the bill text, which has been done in past situations. Democrats also intend to use their full 10 hours of available debate time, now underway.
And then Democrats are prepared to propose dozens of amendments to the package that would be considered in an all-night voting session — or all-day, depending on the hour.
Here's the latest on what's in the bill:
CUTS TO MEDICAID AND OTHER PROGRAMS
To help partly offset the lost tax revenue and new spending, Republicans aim to cut back some long-running government programs: Medicaid, food stamps, green energy incentives and others. It's essentially unraveling the accomplishments of the past two Democratic presidents, Biden and Barack Obama.
Republicans argue they are trying to right-size the safety net programs for the population they were initially designed to serve, mainly pregnant women, the disabled and children, and root out what they describe as waste, fraud and abuse.
The package includes new 80-hour-a-month work requirements for many adults receiving Medicaid and food stamps, including older people up to age 65. Parents of children 14 and older would have to meet the program's work requirements.
There's also a proposed new $35 co-payment that can be charged to patients using Medicaid services.
Some 80 million people rely on Medicaid, which expanded under Obama's Affordable Care Act, and 40 million use the Supplemental Nutritional Assistance Program. Most already work, according to analysts.
All told, the CBO estimates that under the House-passed bill, at least 10.9 million more people would go without health coverage and 3 million more would not qualify for food stamps.
The Senate proposes a $25 billion Rural Hospital Transformation Program to help offset reduced Medicaid dollars. It's a new addition, intended to win over holdout GOP senators and a coalition of House Republicans warning that the proposed Medicaid provider tax cuts would hurt rural hospitals.
Both the House and Senate bills propose a dramatic rollback of the Biden-era green energy tax breaks for electric vehicles. They also would phase out or terminate the various production and investment tax credits companies use to stand up wind, solar and other renewable energy projects.
In total, cuts to Medicaid, food stamps and green energy programs would be expected to produce at least $1.5 trillion in savings.
TAX CUTS ARE THE PRIORITY
Republicans say the bill is crucial because there would be a massive tax increase after December when tax breaks from Trump's first term expire. The legislation contains roughly $3.8 trillion in tax cuts.
The existing tax rates and brackets would become permanent under the bill. It temporarily would add new tax breaks that Trump campaigned on: no taxes on tips, overtime pay or some automotive loans, along with a bigger $6,000 deduction in the Senate draft for older adults who earn no more than $75,000 a year.
It would boost the $2,000 child tax credit to $2,200 under the Senate proposal. Families at lower income levels would not see the full amount.
A cap on state and local deductions, called SALT, would quadruple to $40,000 for five years. It's a provision important to New York and other high tax states, though the House wanted it to last for 10 years.
There are scores of business-related tax cuts.
The wealthiest households would see a $12,000 increase from the legislation, which would cost the poorest people $1,600 a year, according to the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office analysis of the House's version.
Middle-income taxpayers would see a tax break of $500 to $1,500, the CBO said.
MONEY FOR DEPORTATIONS, A BORDER WALL AND THE GOLDEN DOME
The bill would provide some $350 billion for Trump's border and national security agenda, including $46 billion for the U.S.-Mexico border wall and $45 billion for 100,000 migrant detention facility beds, as he aims to fulfill his promise of the largest mass deportation operation in U.S. history.
Money would go for hiring 10,000 new Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers, with $10,000 signing bonuses and a surge of Border Patrol officers, as well. The goal is to deport some 1 million people per year.
The homeland security secretary would have a new $10 billion fund for grants for states that help with federal immigration enforcement and deportation actions. The attorney general would have $3.5 billion for a similar fund, known as Bridging Immigration-related Deficits Experienced Nationwide, or BIDEN, referring to former Democratic President Joe Biden.
To help pay for it all, immigrants would face various new fees, including when seeking asylum protections.
For the Pentagon, the bill would provide billions for ship building, munitions systems, and quality of life measures for servicemen and women, as well as $25 billion for the development of the Golden Dome missile defense system. The Defense Department would have $1 billion for border security.
TRUMP SAVINGS ACCOUNTS AND SO, SO MUCH MORE
A number of extra provisions reflect other GOP priorities.
The House and Senate both have a new children's savings program, called Trump Accounts, with a potential $1,000 deposit from the Treasury.
The Senate provided $40 million to establish Trump's long-sought "National Garden of American Heroes."
There's a new excise tax on university endowments. A $200 tax on gun silencers and short-barreled rifles and shotguns was eliminated. One provision bars money to family planning providers, namely Planned Parenthood, while $88 million is earmarked for a pandemic response accountability committee. Another section expands the Radiation Exposure Compensation Act, a hard-fought provision from Sen. Josh Hawley of Missouri, for those impacted by nuclear development and testing.
Billions would go for the Artemis moon mission and for exploration to Mars.
The bill would deter states from regulating artificial intelligence by linking certain federal AI infrastructure money to maintaining a freeze. Seventeen Republican governors asked GOP leaders to drop the provision.
Additionally, a provision would increase the nation's debt limit, by $5 trillion, to allow continued borrowing to pay already accrued bills.
WHAT'S THE FINAL COST?
Altogether, keeping the existing tax breaks and adding the new ones is expected to cost $3.8 trillion over the decade, the CBO says in its analysis of the House bill. An analysis of the Senate draft is pending.
The CBO estimates the House-passed package would add $2.4 trillion to the nation's deficits over the decade.
Or not, depending on how one does the math.
Senate Republicans are proposing a unique strategy of not counting the existing tax breaks as a new cost because those breaks are already "current policy." Senators say the Senate Budget Committee chairman has the authority to set the baseline for the preferred approach.
Under the Senate GOP view, the tax provisions cost $441 billion, according to the congressional Joint Committee on Taxation.
Democrats and others say this is "magic math" that obscures the true costs of the GOP tax breaks. The Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget puts the Senate tally at $4.2 trillion over the decade.
(From Mountain Eagle and Associated Press reports)
