WASHINGTON — Senate Republicans aren’t on board with the tax and spending cuts their House counterparts passed Thursday.
Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.) said his conference would seek changes to the tax side of the bill and the Medicaid side as well.
“We want to do things that are meaningful in terms of reforming programs, strengthening programs, without affecting beneficiaries,” Thune told reporters in response to a question about Medicaid. “So it’s, I would say, right now, still a very active discussion.”
The so-called One Big Beautiful Bill Act would cut spending on federal health and nutrition programs by $1 trillion to offset part of the cost of nearly $4 trillion in tax cuts intended to be the core of President Donald Trump’s domestic policy agenda.
It’s no surprise that Senate Republicans differ from their House counterparts. From the outset, GOP senators wanted to do the tax part of the legislation as its own bill instead of piling it all into one gigantic piece of legislation. Some senators are still talking about doing separate bills.
