U.S. Senate Majority Chief John Thune (R-SD) speaks at a press convention following the U.S. Senate Republicans’ weekly coverage luncheon on Capitol Hill in Washington, D.C., U.S., June 10, 2025.
Kent Nishimura | Reuters
President Donald Trump’s “massive, lovely invoice” cleared a key procedural hurdle within the U.S. Senate late Saturday evening, pushing the huge spending package deal one step nearer to the president’s desk.
The vote on a movement to proceed to closing debate on the invoice handed with 51 yeas and 49 nays. Each Democrat and two Republicans, Sens. Thom Tillis, N.C., and Rand Paul, Ky., voted towards it.
The precise voting took hours and the measure solely handed after three Republican holdouts — Sens. Mike Lee of Utah, Rick Scott of Florida and Cynthia Lummus of Wyoming — folded and voted sure.
Sen. Ron Johnson, Wis., an outspoken critic of the invoice, in the end modified his vote from a “no” to a “sure.” That extra Republican vote gave the invoice 51 yeas, so Vice President JD Vance didn’t have to forged a vote to interrupt a tie.
The final word passage was a victory for Republican Majority Chief John Thune, S.D., who has pledged to get the invoice to Trump for his signature by July 4.
However the hours of uncertainty and last-minute wrangling underscore the difficult path forward for the controversial package deal.
Saturday’s procedural vote tees up a closing Senate vote on the megabill that can probably occur someday Sunday or Monday.
Democrats, led by Senate Minority Chief Chuck Schumer, are forcing the 940-page invoice to be learn out loud as soon as it heads to full debate on the Senate flooring Sunday.
“We will likely be right here all evening if that is what it takes to learn it,” Schumer wrote Saturday on X.
Whereas the package deal can’t formally move the higher chamber till the ultimate vote, the procedural vote was thought-about a giant take a look at for Thune.
The vote comes after weeks of turmoil and stress over the huge package deal that uncovered bitter coverage disputes and emboldened some agency Republican holdouts.
The sweeping home coverage package deal may also should be handed once more within the Home, which simply narrowly handed its personal model of the invoice final month.
Some Home Republicans have already expressed opposition to key parts of the Senate model of the invoice — most notably deep cuts to Medicaid — probably foreshadowing an in depth vote within the decrease chamber.
Each Thune and Home Speaker Mike Johnson maintain slim majorities of their respective chambers, that means they’ll solely afford to lose the assist of a small variety of Republican lawmakers to move the package deal in a party-line vote.
In the meantime, Trump continues to urge lawmakers to get the package deal handed earlier than Republicans’ self-imposed July 4 deadline.
“President Trump is dedicated to preserving his guarantees, and failure to move this invoice can be the final word betrayal,” the White Home stated in an announcement of administration coverage on Saturday.
