President Donald Trump faced his first major legislative defeat on Friday as a handful of conservatives opposed his “One Big, Beautiful Bill” despite his attempt to rally Republicans.
The House Budget Committee convened on Friday after various committees had marked up their parts of the legislation throughout the week.
The defeat likely does not mean an end for the bill, but rather will require Republicans to regroup and rewrite it to cater to conservative concerns about work requirements to Medicaid, rolling back renewable energy tax credits passed under Joe Biden’s presidency and making deeper spending cuts.
The legislative defeat shows the differing factions that Republicans must navigate with their small majority of only 220, only two seats more than the 218 required to have a majority in the House of Representatives.
The vote came despite Trump’s attempt to rally Republicans on the budget in a post on Truth Social.
“Republicans MUST UNITE behind, “THE ONE, BIG BEAUTIFUL BILL!” Not only does it cut Taxes for ALL Americans, but it will kick millions of Illegal Aliens off of Medicaid to PROTECT it for those who are the ones in real need,” Trump said amid his trip to the Middle East. “The Country will suffer greatly without this Legislation, with their Taxes going up 65%. It will be blamed on the Democrats, but that doesn’t help our Voters.”
But Trump’s lobbying came too late to make a difference. Members of the House Freedom Caucus, a coterie of hardline conservatives, criticized the fact that work requirements for Medicaid did not go into effect until 2029, when they needed to start sooner.
Norman also said that the legislation does not do enough to stop undocumented immigrants from obtaining Medicaid. Federal dollars are not allowed to provide Medicaid for undocumented immigrants, but some states use their money to provide undocumented immigrants with Medicaid.
“Sadly, I'm a hard no until we get this ironed out, and I think we can, we made progress, but it just takes time,” Norman said.
Republicans hope to pass the bill — which would extend the 2017 Trump tax cuts, ramp up spending for immigration enforcement and energy exploration — via the process of reconciliation, which would allow them to sidestep a filibuster in the Senate as long as it relates to the budget.
Rep. Chip Roy of Texas, by far the most stalwart fiscal conservative on the committee, hammered his Republican colleagues for not doing enough to balance the budget.
“I'm not going to sit here and say that everything is hunky dory when this is the Budget Committee,” he said. “We have got to change the direction of this town and to my colleagues on the other side of the aisle. Yes, that means touching Medicaid.”
Republicans in the House had reined in their numerous proposals on Medicaid to only requiring that Medicaid recipients work, engage in community service or an education program for 80 hours a month. But Roy and other fiscal conservatives wanted to roll back parts of Medicaid that expanded under the 2010 health care law signed by Barack Obama.
“We're having conversations as we speak, but something needs to change, or you're not going to get my support,” Roy said.
Roy and Norman were joined by Reps. Josh Brecheen of Oklahoma, Lloyd Smucker of Pennsylvania and Andrew Clyde of Georgia, along with every Democrat on the Budget Committee.
Democrats have mostly spent the new Congress and deliberations on the reconciliation bill, highlighting the changes to Medicaid that Republicans want to make, insisting that even work requirements would unnecessarily throw people off of the program meant for poor people, pregnant mothers, children and people with disabilities.
The failure of the budget resolution in committee represents a problem for House Speaker Mike Johnson, Trump and Republican leadership as a whole. Plenty of Republicans in swing districts fear steep cuts to Medicaid.
In addition, Republicans from Democratic-run states like New York, California and New Jersey want to see a cap on the state and local tax (SALT) deduction for federal income taxes put in place under the 2017 tax law lifted.
Republicans also face numerous looming deadlines given that the tax cuts put in place during Trump’s first term expire at the end of the year and the United States is set to hit the debt limit this summer.
Furthermore, with few legislative accomplishments, Republicans have little to show for the fact that they have control of the White House, House and Senate.
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