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Plus: Administration’s culture war wins
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PRESIDENT TRUMP‘s agenda bill is caught in a quagmire in the House after a dramatic day of negotiations.
Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) opened a procedural vote to tee up final passage for the “big, beautiful bill.”The five-minute vote was open for more than an hour, short on votes due to several Republicans abstaining, before leadership told lawmakers they could leave the floor.
Johnson went to his office along with a group of GOP holdouts, apparently for more negotiations.
If the procedural vote does not have enough GOP support for passage, neither does Trump’s agenda bill. Until the rule vote passes, the full bill can’t be brought up for final passage.
It’s the latest twist in GOP leaders’ quest to get Trump’s package of tax cuts and spending priorities codified into law.
Trump hosted a group of holdouts at the White House on Wednesday morning — conservative fiscal hawks and moderates alike — but his last-minute sales pitch has not yet resulted in enough movement.
The bill can only afford three GOP defections for passage, with all Democrats poised to vote against it.
Some moderate Republicans are queasy about cuts to Medicaid and other social safety net programs.
And a vocal group of conservative fiscal hawks insist they won’t vote for the Senate’s spending and debt levels.
The GOP deficit hawks wrote up a list of complaints with the bill the Senate narrowly passed a day earlier, accusing Johnson and Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.) of going back on their word.
“This was not what Leader Thune and Speaker Johnson promised,” it said.
House Freedom Caucus Chair Andy Harris (R-Md.) said his faction won’t budge unless changes are made. Harris predicted the bill would have to be sent back to the Senate, which is out of town for the Fourth of July holiday.
The mega-bill passed the Senate in a 51-50, vote Tuesday, with Vice President Vance needed to break a tie.
Democrats are powerless to stop the bill if Republicans muster the votes, but they’re trying to make things as painful as possible for the GOP.
The Congressional Black Caucus led an effort to highlight cuts to Medicaid and other safety net programs.
One by one, Democratic lawmakers stood up requesting unanimous consent to alter the procedural rule governing the bill, only to be shot down by the Republican presiding over the floor.
House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.) invoked the late-Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.), whose dramatic vote in 2017 sunk the GOP’s effort to repeal ObamaCare during Trump’s first term in office.
“What type of party would bring a bill to the House floor that rips away Medicaid from those in need?” Jeffries said. “What kind of party would bring a bill to the House floor that literally robs food from the mouths of children, veterans and seniors? And all of this is being done to provide massive tax breaks to their billionaire donors. It’s unconscionable; it’s unacceptable; it’s un-American. All we need are four Republicans — just four — to show John-McCain-level courage.”
MUSK PRAISES TRUMP
Elon Musk praised Trump on Wednesday, a day after the two sent a volley of public threats at one another.
Musk, who has been venting at the Trump agenda bill, said on X that Trump has “successfully resolved several serious conflicts around the world,” pointing to Trump’s announcement that Israel has agreed to terms for a 60-day ceasefire in Gaza.
Musk also expressed regret for wielding a chainsaw at a conservative gathering earlier this year to punctuate his efforts to scale back the government, saying the move “lacked empathy.”
Musk has threatened to primary any Republican that votes in support of Trump’s agenda bill. Trump has threatened to take away any government subsidies received by Musk’s companies.
Tesla’s global sales of its electric vehicles fell 13 percent year-over-year in the second quarter, the company Wednesday.
A federal judge in New York blocked the Trump administration’s attempt to strip immigration protections from Haitians fleeing instability in their country.
The FBI will keep its headquarters Washington, D.C., abandoning plans under the Biden administration to move to the Maryland suburbs.
NEWS THIS AFTERNOON
AP Photo | Alex Brandon
Trump racks up culture war victories
President Trump notched more victories this week in his culture war battles with the news media and universities.
Paramount Global, the parent company of CBS News, agreed to pay $16 million to Trump’s future presidential library to settle a lawsuit Trump brought against the company over a “60 Minutes” interview with former Vice President Kamala Harris that aired during the presidential campaign.
In addition, Paramount said “60 Minutes” will release full transcripts of future interviews with presidential candidates after they air.
There is anger among Democrats and in the media world at Paramount’s decision to settle, which some see as a capitulation to the Trump administration.
Paramount is trying to close a massive merger deal with Hollywood giant Skydance, an estimated $28 billion deal that will need approval from Trump administration regulators.
Shari Redstone, Paramount’s longtime chair, stands to make more than $500 million if the deal goes through.
“Paramount just paid Trump a bribe for merger approval,” Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.), the ranking member of the Senate Finance Committee, posted on X. “When Democrats retake power, I’ll be first in line calling for federal charges. In the meantime, state prosecutors should make the corporate execs who sold out our democracy answer in court, today.”
Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) called it a “dark day for independent journalism.”
The settlement concludes a saga that began after Trump and his attorneys accused “60 Minutes” of “election interference,” saying a Harris interview was edited to make her responses more coherent.
The Federal Communications Commision released the transcript after the election, revealing the full version of an answer Harris gave on the war in Gaza that did not appear during the television broadcast.
“In reporting the news, journalists regularly edit interviews — for time, space or clarity,” the program said at the time. “In making these edits, 60 Minutes is always guided by the truth and what we believe will be most informative to the viewing public — all while working within the constraints of broadcast television.”
At the time, Paramount called the lawsuit “completely without merit,” a sentiment shared by many legal experts and First Amendment advocates. However, by settling, Paramount avoids the discovery process, which can lead to the release of internal communications.
MEANWHILE…
The University of Pennsylvaniahas agreed to bar transgender women from participating on its women’s sports teams and will remove records set by Lia Thomas, the former Penn swimmer who became the first transgender woman to win a NCAA Division I national championship.
The agreement comes after the Education Department found Penn violated Title IX, the federal law against sex discrimination, by allowing Thomas to join the women’s team in 2021.
The university — which is also Trump’s alma mater — will award the titles to the next place finisher and apologize “to each impacted female swimmer.”
The resolution also requires the school to issue a public statement saying it will comply with the administration’s interpretation of Title IX and adopt “biology-based” definitions of the words male and female.
This week, the House Judiciary Committeesubpoenaed Penn and Brown University as part of an investigation into allegations of tuition coordination among Ivy League schools.
This comes after University of Virginia (UVA) President James Ryanannounced he’d leave his post amid a Department of Justice (DOJ) civil rights investigation into the university’s diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) initiatives.
UVA’s Board of Visitors voted unanimously in March to shut down the university’s DEI offices, but the DOJ continued to push for Ryan’s ouster.
Ryan said in a statement that he decided to resign a year earlier than planned so that the university would not lose millions in federal funding.
Democrats notched one culture war victory this week. The Wisconsin Supreme Court struck down the state’s 176-year old abortion ban.
ELSEWHERE…
• A new poll from ISSUU finds former Vice President Harris with a double digit lead over a field of declared and contenders running for governor in California. Harris is at 24 percent, followed by businessman Rick Caruso (D) at 9 percent. However, 40 percent remain undecided and 6 percent of those polled say they won’t vote at all.
💡Perspectives:
•The Hill: Congress must investigate Hegseth’s firing of top legal officers.
• New York Post: Cuomo is NYC’s best shot at defeating Mamdani.
• MSNBC: How Dems can weaponize the Supreme Court’s recent rulings.
• Townhall: Why aren’t Democrats proud to be American?
Read more:
•Trump administration withholding $6B for after-school, summer programs.
Meanwhile, Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkianordered the country to stop cooperating with the International Atomic Energy Agency after American and Israeli airstrikes hit its nuclear facilities.
The move will make it more difficult for international inspectors to monitor Iran’s nuclear program.
• The Department of Defense (DOD) has halted the delivery of some air defense missiles and munitions to Ukraine due to concerns about U.S. military stockpiles being depleted.
“This decision was made to put America’s interests first following a review of our nation’s military support and assistance to other countries across the globe,” White House spokesperson Anna Kelly said in a statement.
Ukraine is moving ahead with plans to produce weapons with some of its international allies, as the war with Russia drags on.
The U.S. has given tens of billions of dollars in military aid to Ukraine since Russia invaded more than three years ago.
• Two Chinese nationals have been charged with spying inside the United States on behalf of Beijing.
• Trump announced a trade deal with Vietnam, setting the tariff rate on the country at 20 percent.
In addition, the U.S. will impose a 40 percent tariffs on goods made in a country with a higher import tax rate, but shipped to the states through Vietnam.
Trump said Vietnam will give the U.S. access to its markets with no tariff rate.
Trump, who hosted Japanese prime minister Shigeru Ishiba at the White House in February, said earlier in the week that Japan is facing a rice shortage but refuses to take American rice.
“They and others are so spoiled from having ripped us off for 30, 40 years that its really hard for them to make a deal,” Trump said.
💡Perspectives:
•The Free Press: Iranian opposition faces its darkest hour.
• New York Post: Trump racks up wins and rewrites the book on diplomacy.
