Closing summary
Donald Trump’s rally speech in Iowa, officially to launch a year-long celebration of America’s 250th anniversary, has just concluded. The president left the stage to the strains of YMCA, after a recitation of mostly the same boasts and exaggerations and lies that pepper all his campaign speeches, including the false claim that the 2020 election was stolen from him. With that, we will wrap up our live coverage of the secnd Trump administration for the day.
Here are some of the day’s major developments:
House Republicans passed Trump’s massive tax-and-spending bill in a 218-214 vote. Trump told reporters he plans to sign the bill on Friday at 5pm EST, as US air force jets fly over the White House.
The Democratic leader, Hakeem Jeffries, prolonged the vote with a record-setting speech in which he decried provisions in the bill that would slash social safety net programs in order to offset the cost of making Trump’s tax cuts permanent.
During a speech to supporters at the Iowa Fair Grounds, Trump used an antisemitic slur, referring to bankers who exploit their clients as “shylocks”.
The Environmental Protection Agency suspended 144 employees who signed a “declaration of dissent” this week “opposing this administration’s policies, including those that undermine the EPA mission of protecting human health and the environment”.
Homeland security says it is investigating an incident in which up to 10 Ice agents were caught on video urinating in public at a school in Los Angeles, close to student and within view of staff.
The US military’s Northern Command announced that it is moving 200 active-duty marines to Florida “to augment US Immigrations and Customs Enforcement’s (Ice) interior immigration enforcement mission”.
After the US supreme court cleared the way for the Trump administration to deport eight men to South Sudan who are not from there, liberal justice Sonia Sotomayor wrote in her dissent: “Today’s order clarifies only one thing: Other litigants must follow the rules, but the administration has the Supreme Court on speed dial.”
At Iowa rally, Trump uses antisemitic slur about bankers
During a speech to supporters at the Iowa Fair Grounds, Donald Trump just used an antisemitic slur to refer to bankers who exploit their clients.
Early in his remarks, which are ongoing, Trump railed against estate taxes, which he said sometimes force people who inherit farms to have to borrow money from banks to pay the tax. The tax-and-spending bill passed by the House on Thursday slightly raises the estate tax exemption.
The president then envisioned what he called a brighter future for Americans in which there would be no such tax and so “no going to the banks and borrowing from, in some cases a fine banker, and in some cases shylocks and bad people”.
In 2014, after then vice-president Joe Biden described those who take financial advantage of American service members as “shylocks”, he called the Anti-Defamation League’s national director to apologize for his “poor choice of words” by making reference to a stereotypical Jewish moneylender in Shakespeare’s Merchant of Venice.
Updated
EPA suspends 144 employees who signed letter of dissent
The Environmental Protection Agency confirmed on Thursday that it has suspended 144 employees who signed a “declaration of dissent” this week in which they said they were “opposing this administration’s policies, including those that undermine the EPA mission of protecting human health and the environment”.
In the declaration made public on Monday, the employees wrote that the agency has been politicized by the Trump administration and protested against the weakening of funding and federal support for climate, environmental and health science.
In a statement Thursday, the EPA said it has a “zero-tolerance policy for career bureaucrats unlawfully undermining, sabotaging and undercutting” the Trump administration’s agenda.
Employees were notified that they had been placed in a “temporary, non-duty, paid status” for the next two weeks, pending an “administrative investigation”, according to a copy of the email obtained by multiple news outlets. “It is important that you understand that this is not a disciplinary action,” the email read.
More than 170 EPA employees put their names to the document, with about 100 more signing anonymously out of fear of retaliation, according to Jeremy Berg, a former editor-in-chief of Science magazine who is not an EPA employee but was among non-EPA scientists or academics to also sign.
Lee Zeldin, the former congressman now leading the agency despite a lack of experience in environmental regulation, accused the scientists of signing a declaration that was “riddled with misinformation”.
Updated
Los Angeles school district demands investigation of Ice agents caught on camera urinating on school grounds in broad daylight
A school district in Los Angeles county has written to homeland security secretary Kristi Noem to demand an investigation of an incident last month, during which Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice) agents gathered at a local high school before a raid and were seen publicly urinating on school grounds, not far from elementary school students attending summer classes.
According to a statement from El Rancho Unified School District, which also released video evidence in the form of surveillance-camera footage, the incident took place on the morning of 17 June at Ruben Salazar high school in Pico Rivera, in south-eastern LA county.
After school staff observed eight to 10 marked and unmarked Ice vehicles arrive on the high school campus, which is adjacent to an elementary school, a park and a pre-school playground, they asked the federal agents to leave.
“At no time was a legal or legitimate reason offered or provided as to why Ice agents entered and remained on school grounds, nor did they provide any judicial warrant,” the school district said in the statement.
Later the same day, federal immigration agents were caught on video roughly arresting a 20-year-old US citizen, Adrian Martinez, during an immigration raid at a nearby Pico Rivera shopping center. Martinez had verbally objected to the arrest of a co-worker but now faces a felony charge of interfering with or impeding a federal agent.
After the Ice agents agreed to leave the high school campus, school district staff told managers that they had seen the federal agents “urinating at Salazar in public view”. A review of surveillance camera video, posted on YouTube by the school district, appears to show 10 federal agents urinating near storage containers in the high school parking lot, between 8.54am and 9.04am.
Not only did Ice agents “unlawfully trespass” on school grounds, the district complained, “but they also did not exercise sound and respectful judgment with the risk of exposing themselves to minors and committing a public offense under California law.”
According to the law firm Eisner Gorin, whose partners have previously worked in the Los Angeles district attorney’s office, when an act of public urination “occurs near a school or park where children are present, it might be classified as lewd conduct” under state law.
Anyone convicted of this offense, the firm notes on its website, faces up to six months in county jail, a fine of up to $1,000 and being required to register as a sex offender.
Los Angeles county supervisor Janice Hahn, who represents Pico Rivera, issued the following statement: “It’s not enough that they’ve spent weeks violently ambushing people, now Ice and CBP agents are allegedly entering school campuses, pulling down their pants, and urinating on playgrounds,” Los Angeles county supervisor Janice Hahn said in a statement.
“It’s a slap in the face to our communities – especially to our children. I join the El Rancho Unified School District in demanding a full federal investigation into this incident.”
A homeland security spokesperson told local news outlets that the incident is now under investigation.
Updated
Trump making US national parks more expensive for foreign tourists
Donald Trump signed an executive order on Thursday to increase entry fees for foreign tourists visiting US national parks.
The order says that the higher fees on foreigners will be used “to improve the infrastructure of, or otherwise enhance enjoyment of or access to, America’s federal recreational areas”.
The White House said in a statement that the increased revenue from jacking up fees on foreign tourists could raise hundreds of millions for conservation projects to improve the parks.
Then again, the disparate treatment of foreigners, following a spate of recent horror stories of tourists who were detained, interrogated and denied entry at US airports, could discourage many would-be tourists from visiting at all.
Updated
Several organizations representing Latino Americans and immigrants accused House Republicans of “betraying” hard-working American families and vulnerable communities.
“This bill sends one message loud and clear — if you are Latino, working-class, or undocumented, you are not welcome here,” Juan Proaño, chief executive of LULAC, said in a statement. “It guts our nation’s moral fabric by placing walls, weapons, and fines where there should be help, hope, and humanity.”
United We Dream, an immigrant rights organization that advocates for Dreamers, warned that the provisions in the bill would have “deadly” consequences, particularly for immigrants and other vulnerable people.
“The monstrous reconciliation bill is glaring proof that the ultra-rich’s greed will stop at nothing to amass wealth and power,” the group said in a statement. “Their violent assaults on our lives as working people have delivered a bill that will leave 17 million people without healthcare, 3 million without access to food, and millions more families under threat of being abducted and disappeared by ICE. Hospitals will be forced to shut their doors and families nationwide will foot the bill of higher food prices and skyrocketing utility costs while our taxpayer dollars go to massive for-profit ICE detention camps and torture prisons abroad.”
UnidosUS chief executive Janet Murguía said House Republicans were stripping away healthcare and nutritional assistance in order to “supercharge a cruel and ineffective deportation machine that is sowing chaos across our nation”.
“Members of Congress who passed this bill have once again betrayed the trust of their constituents — including the Latino community — and chosen cruelty over common sense,” she said in a statement.
Voto Latino president Maria Teresa Kumar said her group would work to ensure voters were aware of the “harmful” bill’s impact before next year’s midterms.
“Make no mistake: we will hold lawmakers accountable where it matters most: at the ballot box,” she said. “And we will continue to inform voters, especially every Latino voter, of what they just did. Actions have consequences.”
US military deploys 200 marines to Florida to bolster immigration enforcement
The US military’s Northern Command announced on Thursday that it is moving 200 active-duty marines to Florida “to augment US Immigrations and Customs Enforcement’s (Ice) interior immigration enforcement mission”.
“These marines are the first wave of US Northern Command’s support of this Ice mission,” the military press released said. “Other support locations will include Louisiana and Texas. Service members participating in this mission will perform strictly non-law enforcement duties within Ice facilities. Their roles will focus on administrative and logistical tasks, and they are specifically prohibited from direct contact with individuals in Ice custody or involvement in any aspect of the custody chain.”
Last month, the Pentagon authorized the mobilization of up to 700 active-duty personnel to support Ice’s deportation push in Florida, Louisiana and Texas.
The same number of marines have already been deployed to Los Angeles following protests over immigration raids.
Updated
Trump plans to use US air force to celebrate signing of his tax and spending bill
Donald Trump, who is on his way to Iowa for a rally, told reporters that, just weeks after staging a military parade on his birthday, he is planning an air show above the White House on Friday to celebrate his signing of the massive tax-and-spending package that passed the House today.
“We’re going to have B-2s and F-22s and F-35s flying right over the White House,” Trump said. “So we’ll be signing with those beautiful planes flying right over our heads.”
The Fourth of July air show comes on the sixth anniversary of Trump’s 2019 independence day speech, in which the president claimed, according to the official transcript, that the US army during the war of 1812 “took over the airports; it did everything it had to do”.
Updated
Trump 'has the supreme court on speed dial' – Sotomayor
The US supreme court on Thursday granted a Trump administration request to pause a lower court’s order that had blocked the Department of Homeland Security from deporting eight migrants to politically unstable South Sudan, clearing the way for the men with no ties to that nation to be moved from a military base in Djibouti where they have been held for weeks.
Last month, the court had put on hold an injunction issued in April by a US district court judge in Boston, Brian Murphy, which requiring migrants set for removal to so-called “third countries” where they have no ties to get a chance to argue that they are at risk of torture there, while a legal challenge plays out.
By a vote of 7-2, with the liberal justice Elena Kagan joining the court’s six conservatives, the court granted the administration’s request to clarify that its decision also extended to Murphy’s separate ruling in May that the administration had violated his injunction in attempting to send a group of migrants to South Sudan.
The US state department has urged Americans to avoid South Sudan “due to crime, kidnapping and armed conflict”.
In her concurring opinion, Kagan wrote: “I continue to believe that this Court should not have stayed the District Court’s April 18 order enjoining the Government from deporting non-citizens to third countries without notice or a meaningful opportunity to be heard.”
“But,” she added, “a majority of this Court saw things differently, and I do not see how a district court can compel compliance with an order that this Court has stayed.”
Two liberal justices, Sonia Sotomayor and Ketanji Brown Jackson, dissented from the decision.
“What the Government wants to do, concretely, is send the eight noncitizens it illegally removed from the United States from Djibouti to South Sudan, where they will be turned over to the local authorities without regard for the likelihood that they will face torture or death,” Sotomayor wrote in her dissent, which was joined by Jackson.
“Today’s order clarifies only one thing: Other litigants must follow the rules, but the administration has the Supreme Court on speed dial,” she added.
Updated
'This is Project 2025 in action' Harris says of Republican cuts to health and food assistance
Among the Democrats expressing dismay at the passage of Trump’s tax-and-spending bill are the party’s two previous nominees who ran against him for president, Kamala Harris and Joe Biden.
“Republicans in Congress have voted to devastate millions of people across our nation – kicking Americans off their health care, shuttering hospitals, eliminating food assistance, and raising costs,” Harris said in a social media post on Thursday.
“This is Project 2025 in action,” she added, reminding voters that cuts to Medicaid and Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (Snap) benefits were both part of the conservative Heritage Foundation’s blueprint for Trump’s second term that she had railed against during her abbreviated campaign for the presidency last year.
“The Republican budget bill is not only reckless – it’s cruel,” Biden posted about 30 minutes before Harris. “It slashes Medicaid and takes away health care from millions of Americans. It closes rural hospitals and cuts food assistance for our veterans and seniors. It jacks up energy bills. And it could trigger deep cuts to Medicare while driving up the deficit by $4tn. All of this to give a massive tax break to billionaires. Working people deserve better.”
Updated
Summary
House Republicans passed Trump’s “one big, beautiful bill” in a 218-214 vote that was almost entirely along party lines on Thursday. The bill next goes to the president for his signature. The White House has said Trump is expected to sign the bill on Friday at 5pm EST.
The Democratic leader, Hakeem Jeffries, prolonged the vote with a record-setting speech in which he decried provisions in the bill that would slash social safety net programs in order to offset the cost of making Trump’s tax cuts permanent.
Only two House Republicans voted against the measure, for different reasons that showed the ideological span of the party’s wafer-thin majority. Kentucky congressman Thomas Massie, a libertarian-leaning fiscal hawk who has drawn Trump’s wrath for opposing his agenda, and Pennsylvania congressman Brian Fitzpatrick, who was opposed to the Medicaid cuts.
Democrats led by Jeffries assailed the bill as “an all-out assault on the American people”. Meanwhile, Democratic groups were vowing to hammer Republicans for their support of a bill that projections say would lead millions of Americans to lose their health insurance.
Updated
Maryland congressman Andy Harris, chair of the far-right House Freedom caucus, told reporters on Capitol Hill: “If winning is caving, then I guess we caved.”
Harris repeatedly cited unspecified “agreements” with the Trump administration for persuading himself and other hardliners to drop their objections to the bill. He declined to divulge any details about the “agreement” brokered at the White House, telling reporters to “ask the president”.
“This is a very good Republican product,” he added. “It’s going to move the president’s agenda forward. It’s going to actually seriously deal with spending and, of course, not provide a tax increase to middle-class America.”
The bill is projected to add trillions to the national debt.
Updated
Democrats and liberal activists have assailed the bill, warning that they will hold Republicans who voted for it accountable in next year’s midterm elections.
“This budget is as cruel as it is corrupt. House Republicans just voted to gut Medicaid, kick millions off Snap, rip free school lunches from kids, and pour billions into Ice – all so their donors can rake in more tax breaks,” said Indivisible’s co-founder and co-executive director Ezra Levin. “Trump just made every single Republican more vulnerable – and while they’ll try to spin this disastrous bill, they know exactly how deep the hole they’ve dug is. But when Trump snaps his fingers, they fall in line – no matter how many families they throw under the bus. That spineless loyalty will be their downfall.”
Updated
Congressman Tim Burchett, a Tennessee Republican who was one of the conservative holdouts, told reporters on Capitol Hill that Trump understands the art of a deadline.
“I believe that’s why they called the vote last night, because that put everybody at the table, and they said, ‘This is the deadline,’” he said, explaining how the president and leaders eventually quelled their short-lived revolt.
Major changes to the bill, which they had demanded, would have required Senate approval, which Burchett did not believe they would get again. “It would have died, it would have never it would have never passed. If it went back to the Senate, [Alaska senator Lisa] Murkowski – we would never get her vote again.”
Updated
Trump to sign tax and spending bill on Friday
The White House press secretary, Karoline Leavitt, has told reporters that Donald Trump plans to sign the colossal tax and spending bill at 5pm EST on Friday, the Independence Day holiday. It will come as the White House is preparing to hold a Fourth of July picnic to mark the nation’s 249th birthday.
Updated
At a signing ceremony on Thursday afternoon, Mike Johnson joked that he was operating on such little sleep after marathon days of voting that “I’m a danger to myself and others”.
“We knew that if we won, and we believed we would, we knew that if we got unified government, we’d have to quite literally fix every area of public policy,” Johnson said. “Everything was an absolute disaster under the Biden-Harris, radical, woke, progressive Democrat regime, and we took the best effort that we could, in one big, beautiful bill, to fix as much of it as we could.”
Johnson then signed the legislation that will be sent to the White House.
Updated
Massie, the other Republican who has consistently opposed the bill, said he voted against it on Thursday because of the harm he believes it would do to the nation’s finances.
“I voted No on final passage because it will significantly increase U.S. budget deficits in the near term, negatively impacting all Americans through sustained inflation and high interest rates,” he wrote on X.
Although there were some conservative wins in the budget reconciliation bill (OBBBA), I voted No on final passage because it will significantly increase U.S. budget deficits in the near term, negatively impacting all Americans through sustained inflation and high interest rates. pic.twitter.com/rjcRc8t0ay
— Thomas Massie (@RepThomasMassie) July 3, 2025
Congressman Brian Fitzpatrick, one of only two Republicans who voted against the president’s megabill, has issued a statement explaining his decision.
As I’ve stated throughout these negotiations, with each iteration of legislative text that was placed on the House floor, I’ve maintained a close and watchful eye on the specific details of these provisions, and determined the specific district impact, positive or negative, on our PA-1 community.
I voted to strengthen Medicaid protections, to permanently extend middle class tax cuts, for enhanced small business tax relief, and for historic investments in our border security and our military. However, it was the Senate’s amendments to Medicaid, in addition to several other Senate provisions, that altered the analysis for our PA-1 community. The original House language was written in a way that protected our community; the Senate amendments fell short of our standard. I believe in, and will always fight for, policies that are thoughtful, compassionate, and good for our community. It is this standard that will always guide my legislative decisions.
Fitzpatrick represents a competitive, heavily suburban Pennsylvania district.
Updated
The White House is celebrating passage of the president’s domestic policy bill.
VICTORY: The One Big Beautiful Bill Passes U.S. Congress, Heads to President Trump’s Desk 🇺🇸🎉 pic.twitter.com/d1nbOlL21G
— The White House (@WhiteHouse) July 3, 2025
Republican leaders are taking a victory lap, heaping praise on “our leader”.
“They doubted us,” said Representative Lisa McLain of Michigan, the House GOP conference chair. “But here we are again! What are we? Six and zero?”
“We delivered on our promises to the American people – no taxes on tips, no taxes on overtime, tax relief for seniors, enhanced childcare tax credits, elimination of the death tax, more Ice agents – we’re finishing the border wall and funding the golden dome.”
Representative Tom Emmer, another member of leadership, repeated the Republican claim that the bill cuts only “waste, fraud and abuse” from Medicaid. According to estimates from the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office, the bill cuts roughly $1t from Medicaid, a joint federal and state health insurance program for disabled and low-income Americans. It would result in an estimated 11.8 million people losing health insurance over the next decade.
“To put it simply,” Emmer said, “this bill is President Trump’s ‘Make America Great Again’ agenda. Being codified into law from Minnesota to Texas and Maine to California, there are wins in this legislation for every single American.”
Updated
Here’s a breakdown of what’s in the tax cut and spending bill that just passed the House, and next goes to Trump for his signature.
The bill is largely the same version as the one Senate Republicans narrowly passed, with JD Vance casting the tie-breaking vote. Trump has imposed a 4 July deadline for the legislation to be on his desk.
House passes Trump's megabill, sends it to the president's desk
In a vote of 218-214, Republicans passed Trump’s megabill, sending it to the president’s desk by his self-imposed Independence Day deadline. Republicans burst into chants of “U-S-A!”
In the end, two Republicans voted against the bill: Kentucky congressman Thomas Massie, a libertarian-leaning fiscal hawk who has drawn Trump’s wrath for opposing his agenda, and Pennsylvania congressman Brian Fitzpatrick, who was opposed to the Medicaid cuts.
Updated
The 15-minute voting window has now closed – though that matters little. It will remain open for as long as Republican leaders believe they need.
So far, two Republicans are recorded as voting against the bill, though nothing is final until the vote officially closes. One Republican – conservative Ralph Norman, has yet to vote, according to CSPAN.
Updated
Passage would amount to a remarkable feat for Johnson, who has navigated, in his own words, “so many dire straits” since assuming the gavel.
Johnson, once a relatively unknown congressman from Louisiana, came to power after the historic ouster of former speaker Kevin McCarthy, who was toppled by hardliners in his own party. Many expected Johnson – soft-spoken, deeply religious and lacking leadership experience – would meet a similar fate.
Yet, in the months since, Johnson has surprised both his critics and colleagues by holding together one of the narrowest House majorities in modern history. He has overcome the threat of rebellion from the hard-right faction of his party and mollified moderates uneasy with aspects of the president’s agenda.
One critical factor in his success so far: Trump’s support. The president’s backing has largely helped insulate Johnson from the kind of rightwing backlash.
Updated
House voting on Trump's domestic policy bill
The House has officially started voting on final passage of Trump’s so-called “one big, beautiful” bill – more than 24 hours after it the reconciliation package was first brought to the floor. It is expected to narrowly pass, with all Democrats opposed.
Updated
Johnson closed his remarks with a plea to members to help pass Trump’s megabill, though his cheery delivered made clear he no longer had any doubts about the outcome.
“The president of the United States is waiting with his pen. The American people are waiting for this relief,” Johnson said. “We’ve heard enough talk. It’s time for action. Let’s finish the job for him, vote yes on the bill.”
Johnson said Americans gave Republicans a mandate to pass this legislation when the handed the levers of power in Washington to Trump and his party.
“That election was decisive. It was a bellwether. It was a time for choosing. And I tell you what the American people chose. Overwhelmingly, they chose the Republican party,” he said. “And the reason they did that – they didn’t come hesitantly. They came with hopeful anticipation. You know why? Because this is not your father’s Democratic party. They went so far, full speed, to the far left, and their radical, woke progressive agenda, that nonsense that they tried to push on the people, was rejected by the people.”
Johnson later declared that the Republican party stands for “law and order”.
“The idea that those who put their own lives on the line to protect us would be assaulted for doing their jobs is unconscionable,” he declared, an apparent reference to the LA protests in which some individuals were accused of assaulting officers. Upon taking office, Trump pardoned hundreds of rioters who assaulted police during the January 6 attack on the US Capitol.
Updated
Republican speaker takes back the House floor: 'We waited long enough'
Mike Johnson is now speaking, promising to abide by Ronald Reagan’s adage that no speech should be longer than 20 minutes.
Of the content of Jeffries remarks, Johnson said: “It takes a lot longer to build a lie than to tell the simple truth.”
Then, declaring today a “hugely important one in the history of our nation” said the chamber would soon vote on Trump’s “big, beautiful” bill.
“We waited long enough, some of us have literally been up for days now,” he said.
Updated
Republican congressman Jason Smith from Missouri has just stepped up to the lectern to decry Jeffries’ speech as a “bunch of hogwash” that mischaracterized the president’s bill.
“The eight hours of hogwash that we just heard will not change the outcome that you will see very shortly when we deliver historic tax relief for working families owners and farmers,” he said, before bringing the speaker to the lectern.
Updated
Jeffries ends marathon speech: “I yield back.”
After speaking for eight hours and 44 minutes, Jeffries concluded his remarks. Invoking the legacy of the late civil rights activist and Georgia congressman John Lewis, Jeffries vowed that Democrats would “press on”.
“No matter what the outcome is, on this singular day, we’re going to press on,” he said. “We’re going to press on until victory is won.”
When he yielded the floor back, Democrats erupted in applause and chants of “Hakeem”.
Updated
Jeffries, in closing, is reading from the Declaration of Independence on the eve of the country’s 249th birthday.
He said the document’s introduction lays out the founders’ “aspirational” dreams for a new country that guaranteed its citizens the inalienable rights of “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness”. But the rest of the declaration, he said, reads more like an “indictment against an out-of-control king”.
“And why was that indictment issued? I think it was because the framers of this great country, they were fed up with Project 1775 and so they implemented Project 1776,” he declared. “So I know that there are people concerned with what’s happening in America, but understand, what our journey teaches us is that after Project 2025 comes Project 2026.”
Updated
Jeffries breaks the record for longest House floor speech
House minority leader Hakeem Jeffries has delivered the longest floor speech in modern House history, a forceful eight-plus-hour denunciation of the president’s marquee domestic policy bill which he called an “abomination”.
“Shame on this institution if this bill passes,” Jeffries said, as Democrats chanted “shame”. “We are better than this.”
Updated
In what appears to be the closing stretch of Jeffries’s hours-long speech, the minority leader has turned to the subject of faith. With the cadence of a preacher, the minority leader, read from the Bible, the 25th chapter of Matthew: “For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat.”
“I’m not down with this situation,” he said, adding to scripture with his own words. “I was sick – I had medical problems. Maybe I needed Medicare or Medicaid or the Affordable Care Act or the children’s health insurance program or planned parenthood. I was sick. And you look after me. I was in prison and you came to visit me. We have a right as members of Congress to visit people who are detained. It’s not just in law. It’s right here in Matthew!”
Then Jeffries leveled a sharp criticism, which he said was not intended to question anyone’s faith, but probably tweaked the deeply religious House speaker who is delivering this bill for a president the minority leader called a “wannabe king”.
“You got some folks in this town, they go to church and they pray – P-R-A-Y – on Sunday,” Jeffries declared, his voice rising as Democrats applauded, “And then come to Congress and prey – P-R-E-Y – on the American people. I’m not down with that kind of faith.”
Updated
Jeffries' 'magic minute' speech passes the eight-hour mark
The minority leader’s marathon floor speech has stretched into its eighth hour. Jeffries began speaking shortly before 5am Washington time. If he speaks for roughly another half-hour, he will have set the record for the longest House floor speech.
Updated
Late last night, Trump’s bill seemed to be in peril. But over the course of hours, the president and the speaker of the House, Mike Johnson, were able to persuade a group of so-called budget hawks concerned with the fiscal impact of the legislation – the most expensive in a generation that is projected to add at least $3.3tn to the nation’s debt over the next 10 years – to drop their objections.
“We held out as long as we could,” Representative Ralph Norman said on CNBC’s Squawk Box on Thursday morning. The conservative said the president warned him that changing the bill, which would require another vote in the Senate, would only make it worse.
He said Trump offered assurances that his administration would enforce rules for wind or solar projects to qualify for the tax credits under the Biden-era Inflation Reduction Act.
“What he’s going to do is use his powers as chief executive to make sure that the companies that apply for solar credits, as an example, he’s going to make sure that they’re doing what they say when they say they’ve started construction,” he said. “He’s going to make sure they’ve done that.”
But the bill the House is voting on is the bill that was sent to them by the Senate – the very one these conservatives railed against – and are now poised to vote for this afternoon.
Updated
JD Vance has said an undecided Republican congressman texted to him to say Jeffries’ marathon speech drove him to a “firm yes” on Trump’s domestic policy bill.
Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez shot back on X:
Hmm! Was it @RepGarbarino?
— Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (@AOC) July 3, 2025
After all, he “fell asleep” and conveniently missed the first vote on this bill.
Did he just wake up and decide to throw Long Island families off their healthcare? Because a speech by a Democrat made him sad? ☹️ https://t.co/I7YHT7DCyB
During his speech, Jeffries has been appealing to House Republicans with concerns about the legislation to vote against it, naming several who have publicly expressed concern with some of the provisions. Republicans can only afford three defections, with all Democrats opposed.
Updated
Closing in on McCarthy’s record, Jeffries said he’s “still got a little more” to say.
“Donald Trump’s deadline may be Independence Day. That ain’t my deadline,” Jeffries said, referring to the president’s demand that Republicans send him his “big, beautiful” bill by Friday. “You know why, Mr Speaker? We don’t work for Donald Trump. We work for the American people.”
Democrats on the floor erupted in applause.
Updated
Jeffries is skipping through some of the proposals offered by Democrats, all of which were dismissed or voted down by the Republican majority. Some sought to shield children or low-income Americans from losing healthcare or other benefits under the Republican bill. Another would have nullified Trump’s executive order seeking to strip babies born to undocumented parents of US citizenship.
“Amendment after amendment after amendment that Democrats have introduced to try to relieve the pain that is being visited upon the American people by this one big, ugly bill,” Jeffries said, previewing what will form the crux of Democrats’ case against Republicans in next year’s midterm elections.
Updated
Jeffries holds the floor for seven hours
Jeffries’s marathon speech is closing in on the all-time record, set by the former House speaker Kevin McCarthy. After seven hours, the minority leader has indicated that he’s ready to go well into the afternoon to prolong debate on what he is decrying as “reverse Robinhood” legislation.
Updated
Floor speeches can be a lonely spectacle. So often, House members are speaking to a sea of empty chairs, their words echoing across the chamber.
But today, Democrats are not only in attendance, but paying rapt attention. Democrats, who are uniformly opposed to the bill, are rotating into the seats behind the lectern where Jeffries is speaking. They are clapping and cheering him on as his nears hour seven of his speech.
He also spoke personally – speaking about his mother and late father, an Air Force veteran whose nickname was “Puddin”. Jeffries said he regrets never asking his father the origins of the moniker. When he mentioned his mother was from Connecticut, the state’s Democratic representatives hooted loudly.
At one point, Jeffries mentioned he might not have time to tell his grandmother’s story.
“You got time!” Democrats chanted. “Take your time!”
“I’ve got so many stories I feel like I’m in a hip-hop studio right now,” Jeffries, the Brooklyn-born representative with a penchant for speaking with hip-hop lyricism, said.
Updated
Trump’s assault on knowledge and diversity is eroding the quality of fundamental research funded at the National Science Foundation (NSF), the premier federal investor in basic science and engineering, which threatens the future of innovation and economic growth in the US, according to a new Guardian investigation.
The gold standard peer-reviewed process used by the NSF to support cutting-edge, high-impact science is being undermined by the chaotic cuts to staff, programs and grants, as well as meddling by the so-called “department of government efficiency” (Doge), according to multiple current and former NSF employees.
“Before Trump, the review process was based on merit and impact. Now, it’s like rolling the dice because a Doge person has the final say,” said one current NSF program officer. “There has never in the history of NSF been anything like this. It’s disgusting what we’re being instructed to do.”
Among the biggest concerns is the inevitable brain drain – and what this means for solving urgent problems facing the US and the rest of the world. A generation of scientific talent is at the brink of being lost to overseas competitors by the Trump administration’s dismantling of the NSF – and other research agencies such as the US Geological Survey (USGS), the research arm of the Interior department,and Noaa – which threatens to derail advances in tackling existential threats to food, water and biodiversity, and addressing the climate crisis.
Trump’s “big, beautiful” budget bill calls for a 56% cut to the current $9bn NSF budget, as well as a 73% reduction in staff and fellowships – with graduate students among the hardest hit. Yet the NSF student pipeline provides experts for the oil and gas, mining, chemical, big tech and other industries which support Trump, in addition to academic and government-funded agencies. The NSF, founded in 1950, has contributed to major breakthroughs in organ transplants, gene technology, AI, smartphones and the internet, extreme weather and other hazard warning systems, American sign language, cybersecurity and even the language app Duolingo.
Trump’s monstrous budget bill also cuts the USGS budget by 39% including entirely slashing the agency’s ecosystems mission area, which leads federal research on species and ecosystems and houses the climate-adaptation science centers.
Read more
Updated
Jeffries has also denounced the “deportation machine” that will put “on steroids” by this bill. He said Democrats believe in border security and immigration reform – but decried the devastating impact it has had on immigrant communities and American families.
He told the story of Narciso Barranco, a landscaper and father of three US marines who was beaten and arrested by immigration agents as he was working outside of an Ihop in Santa Ana, California. Barranco’s sons – including two who are active duty – say they were working to adjust his immigration status after living in the US for decades without documentation before he was violently detained during the Trump administration’s stepped up raids across southern California. This incident was captured on video.
“This is not the way that anyone in the United States should be treated,” Jeffries said, “particularly not the father of three patriotic marines.”
He also demanded that agents stop wearing masks to conceal their identity –the Department of Homeland Security has said they do for their safety.
“These masks need to come down,” Jeffries declared to applause from Democrats. “These agents should just be held to the same set of standards as every other law enforcement office in the United States of America.”
Updated
Jeffries holds the floor for six hours
Jeffries is still speaking, passing the six-hour mark. The Democratic leader just indicated that he plans to keep going for at least several more hours, drawling chuckles as he said he might enter into the record the Declaration of Independence, adopted by the Continental Congress on 4 July 1776, “later on today”.
Jeffries has spent much of his time reading testimonials from Americans – parents, veterans, business owners – all of whom say they would be harmed by a bill Democrats says would “explode our nation’s debt” and “devastate our social safety net”.
At one point, he quoted Alaska senator Lisa Murkowski, a Republican who voted in favor of the legislation despite expressing grave concerns about its impact on constituents: “This was one of the hardest votes I have taken during my time in the Senate.”
“This should not be a hard vote, Senator Murkowski,” Jeffries said. “This should be a ‘hell no’ vote on behalf of the people you were sent to Washington to represent. It’s a ‘hell no’ vote for us.”
Updated
The White House is confident the House will deliver Trump an Independence Day victory.
Punchbowl News, a Washington-based outlet that reports exhaustively on Congress, said a signing ceremony is being prepared for tomorrow evening – though the timing will probably depend on how long Jeffries keeps speaking.
NEW -- I am now told that this signing ceremony will be at 5 p.m. tomorrow.
— Jake Sherman (@JakeSherman) July 3, 2025
Seems like it's a moving target https://t.co/JJu017sA6w
Updated
US supreme court to weigh transgender student sports bans
The US supreme court announced on Thursday that it will hear arguments next term in a legal battle over state laws banning transgender athletes from female sports teams at public sector schools.
The high court took up two cases involving transgender student athletes who had challenged bans on their participation on school sports teams in West Virginia and Idaho. The states petitioned for the supreme court to take up the matter after lower court rulings in favor of the athletes.
The decision means the court is prepared to take up another civil rights challenge to Republican-backed restrictions on transgender people.
The supreme court is expected to hear arguments in the matter during its next term, which begins in October.
Trump confirms call with Putin
Trump is taking a break from pressuring holdout Republicans to back his “big, beautiful” domestic policy bill to speak to Russian leader Vladimir Putin.
“Will be speaking to President Putin of Russia at 10:00 A.M. Thank you!” Trump declared in a social media post shortly before the announced time.
The call comes after the Pentagon said earlier this week that it was pausing shipment of some weapons to Ukraine amid concerns that US stockpiles were running too low – prompting alarm in Kyiv.
Follow our international blog for more:
Updated
Jeffries holds the floor for more than five hours – and is still going
Jeffries has just passed the five-hour mark and has no intention of stopping: “We still got some ground to cover.”
“We are going to continue as Democrats to take our sweet time on behalf of the American people because the issues are too significant to ever walk away from,” Jeffries said, to cheers from the Democrats in the chamber.
Hakeem Jeffries has been speaking for five hours now — since 4:53 a.m. — as Democrats stall the final passage of Trump’s “Big Beautiful Bill.”
— The Recount (@therecount) July 3, 2025
The record for the longest House floor speech is 8 hours, 32 minutes, set by Kevin McCarthy in 2021. pic.twitter.com/kbBk0lfGNP
The Democrat began speaking shortly before 5am Washington time.
“Join us! Join us!” Jeffries said, appealing to Republicans who have expressed concerns with the bill. “Just four, y’all. We welcome you.”
Updated
Explainer: Why can Jeffries talk for hours on the House floor?
After a marathon night of arm-twisting, cajoling and pressure by tweet, House Republicans say they’re finally read to vote on Trump’s $4.5tn tax and spending package – a colossal piece of legislation the president wants passed by Friday, the Independence Day holiday.
Final debate on the 887-page megabill began in the predawn hours of Thursday morning. But the Democratic leader, Hakeem Jeffries, has been holding the floor for hours railing against the legislation he and Democrats have warned will slash social safety net programs that millions of American families and children rely on.
Democrats are united against what they have renamed the “big ugly” bill, leaving the speaker scrambling to quell concerns within the Republican ranks from more centrist members worried about the cuts to Medicaid and fiscal hawks furious about the debt.
Hours earlier, the House cleared the way for debate with a 219-to-213 vote, suggesting Johnson and the president had quelled the revolt and secured the necessary number of Republicans needed to pass the bill.
But when that happens may depend on Jeffries, who is using his so-called “magic minute” – a tradition that allows House leaders to speak for as long as they want during a floor debate.
In 2021, then House Republican leader Kevin McCarthy spoke for a record-setting eight hours and 32 minutes, in protest of Joe Biden’s signature domestic policy legislation, which ultimately passed when he ceded the floor.
Updated
“I’m still here to take my sweet time”
Hakeem Jeffries continues to hold the House floor, joking about the fact that he has unlimited time to speak because of his role as Democratic leader.
“The American people do not deserve to die as a result of the Republican cruelty that’s in this legislation,” he said.
Democratic minority leader passes fourth hour of speaking on House floor
Hakeem Jeffries, now passing four hours on the House floor, said the tax and spending bill takes a “chainsaw” to Medicare, Medicaid, nutritional assistance for hungry children, and vulnerable Americans. But, he said, Democrats are “here to make clear, Mr Speaker, we’re determined to take a chainsaw to Project 2025”.
Updated
Explainer: What's in Trump's major tax bill?
My colleague Chris Stein has a helpful explainer on what’s in the bill, from extensions of major tax cuts to $45bn for Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice) to build new detention facilities and more benefits for the rich than the poor.
Updated
As Democratic leader Hakeem Jeffries continues to delay a vote with his now three-hour-plus floor speech, Republicans remain confident they have the slim margin they need to pass the bill.
Appearing on Fox News Thursday morning, the House majority leader, Steve Scalise of Louisiana, said he expects the bill to move to Donald Trump’s desk in “the next two hours”.
That would mean a vote would need to occur by 10am in Washington.
Updated
With a narrow 220-212 majority, Republicans can afford no more than three defections to get a final bill to Donald Trump’s desk.
Democrats are united in opposition to the bill, saying that its tax breaks disproportionately benefit the wealthy while cutting services that lower- and middle-income Americans rely on. The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office estimated that almost 12 million people could lose health insurance as a result of the bill.
“This bill is catastrophic. It is not policy, it is punishment,” Democratic representative Jim McGovern said in debate on the House floor.
Republicans in Congress have struggled to stay united in recent years, but they also have not defied Trump since he returned to the White House in January.
Any changes made by the House would require another Senate vote, which would make it all but impossible to meet the 4 July deadline.
The legislation contains most of Trump’s top domestic priorities, from tax cuts to immigration enforcement. The bill would extend Trump’s 2017 tax cuts, cut health and food safety net programs, fund Trump’s immigration crackdown, and zero out many green-energy incentives. It also includes a $5tn increase in the nation’s debt ceiling, which lawmakers must address in the coming months or risk a devastating default.
The Medicaid cuts have also raised concerns among some Republicans, prompting the Senate to set aside more money for rural hospitals.
Jeffries continues floor speech opposing bill, passing three hours
The House minority leader, Hakeem Jeffries, has now been speaking for more than three hours on the House floor, highlighting the stories of Americans across the country who will be hurt by the bill.
“This is a crime scene and House Democrats want no part of it,” Jeffries said shortly after 8am in Washington. “And Mr Speaker, this is why we want no part of it.”
A final debate on the floor began shortly before 4am ET after the House passed a procedural vote. You can livestream the latest at the top of the blog.
A final House vote on the bill should follow this debate.
Updated
Bill an 'abomination' that will 'reward billionaires', says Jeffries
Democratic leader Hakeem Jeffries has spoken in “strong opposition of Donald Trump’s one big ugly bill”. Jeffries argued that the bill, that he described as an “abomination”, would gut Medicaid and “rip food from the mouth of children, seniors and veterans”. Instead, he said, it would “reward billionaires with massive tax breaks”.
Jeffries continued:
Every single Democrat stands in strong opposition to this bill because we are standing up for the American people.
He questioned why, if the Republicans were so proud of the bill, the debate had begun in the early hours. Many of his comments were followed by applause.
Jeffries said the bill would “hurt everyday Americans” and “people in America will die unncessary deaths”. He added:
That is outrageous, that is disgusting. That is not what we should be doing here in the United States House of Representatives.
House debates Trump’s tax-and-spending bill after overnight advancement
Good morning and welcome to our blog covering US politics.
The House has moved toward a final vote on Donald Trump’s sweeping tax-and-spending bill after hours of wrangling. The procedural vote had been initially delayed by the blocking of a rule that allows the debate to begin. But eventually, the House voted 219-213 to move forward at about 3.30AM ET.
The debate lasted much longer than expected also, mainly due to a marathon session by Democratic leader Hakeem Jeffries, who labelled the legislation a “one big ugly bill” and read out many letters from Americans saying what Medicaid means to them.
Jeffries is still speaking on the House floor, saying in the early hours of Thursday morning that he would take his “sweet time” telling the stories of Americans whose lives will be upended by the legislation if it passes.
Meanwhile, House speaker Mike Johnson was optimistic Wednesday night and said lawmakers had a “long, productive day” discussing the issues, Reuters reported. He also praised Trump for making phone calls to the holdouts through the early hours of Thursday morning.
“There couldn’t be a more engaged and involved president,” the speaker told reporters.
Stick with us today as we break down the events of the day.
