Republicans’ “big, beautiful bill” is one vote away from President Donald Trump’s desk after clearing a key procedural hurdle that sets up a floor vote early Thursday morning.
Pulling an all-nighter two days after senators did the same, House Republicans were finally able to unite on the test vote around 3:30 a.m. Thursday — closing out a six-hour voting window that might have been extraordinary if the previous vote hadn’t been held open nine hours for similar reasons.
The discord inside the House GOP centered on Senate changes to the megabill, which first passed the House in May. Senators piled on more tax cuts and toughed some changes to safety-net programs, creating a two-front hassle for House whips that began early Wednesday morning and stretched overnight.
But the 219-213 vote on the “rule” — the procedural measure setting up final floor debate on the megabill — bodes well for Speaker Mike Johnson as he seeks to keep a promise to send the bill holding the lion’s share of the Republican legislative agenda to Trump’s desk by July 4.
“It’s been a good day — we’re in a good place right now,” Johnson said last Wednesday after the earlier, nine-hour procedural vote. “This is the legislative process. This is exactly how I think the framers intended for it to work.”
The breakthrough came after hours of meetings between GOP leadership and holdouts, exploring what executive actions or other promises could assuage hard-line fiscal hawks who were incensed about the Senate-passed bill’s budget deficits.
Action was nudged along by a Truth Social post from the president, just minutes after members of the House Freedom Caucus told reporters they didn’t want to vote Wednesday night.
“It looks like the House is ready to vote tonight. We had GREAT conversations all day, and the Republican House Majority is UNITED, for the Good of our Country, delivering the Biggest Tax Cuts in History and MASSIVE Growth. Let’s go Republicans, and everyone else – MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN!” Trump wrote on his social media platform.
Within minutes of Trump’s call for a vote, House leaders locked in the schedule and called the vote. The move was essentially a dare to the Freedom Caucus holdouts to vote against the legislation that is the cornerstone of Trump’s agenda. But many more hours of talks ensued.
Later Trump shared the exasperation many on Capitol Hill shared: “FOR REPUBLICANS, THIS SHOULD BE AN EASY YES VOTE. RIDICULOUS!!!”
In the end, only one Republican, moderate Brian Fitzpatrick of Pennsylvania, joined Democrats in voting against the rule for floor consideration of the Senate-passed bill
Cassandra Dumay and David Lim contributed to this report.
