Thune Says Senate GOP Has Deal to Pass Tax Bill

Jack Fitzpatrick, Bloomberg Government Reporter, discusses the Senate's ongoing 'vote-a-rama' for Trump's tax bill.

Senate Majority Leader John Thune said his chamber will soon vote on passage of President Donald Trump’s tax and spending bill after securing enough support to pass the legislation.

“I believe we do” have enough votes to pass the bill, Thune said. “But like I’ve said I’m of Scandinavian heritage so I’ve always been a realist so we will see what happens.”

The Senate worked through the night on Trump’s $3.3 trillion tax and spending package, with Republican leaders still negotiating Tuesday morning with key GOP holdouts.

Thune did not specify what changes were made to the bill to convince holdouts to support the measure.

Alaska Republican Lisa Murkowski, a moderate concerned about Medicaid and green energy cuts, appeared to be the central focus of leaders’ attention early Tuesday.

Throughout the negotiations in recent days, there have been eight major Republican holdouts. Thune can afford to lose only three senators and still pass the measure. Two — Rand Paul of Kentucky and Thom Tillis of North Carolina — have said they are solidly against it, leaving very little room for error as the South Dakota Republican tries to get to 50 votes on the package.

Senate aides huddled on the chamber floor Tuesday morning going line-by-line through last-minute revisions to the bill.

Murkowski, whose efforts to protect her home state from Medicaid cuts were rejected by the Senate ruleskeeper, had meetings both on and off the Senate floor throughout the night. She would not divulge early Tuesday whether she’d support the bill.

“The sun is up, I’m going to go have a cup of coffee,” Murkowski told reporters.

Murkowski had backed an effort to soften an aggressive planned phase-out of subsidies for wind and solar projects under Trump’s tax-and-spending package.

Senate aides huddled on the chamber floor Tuesday morning going line-by-line through last-minute revisions to the bill.

Murkowski, whose efforts to protect her home state from Medicaid cuts were rejected by the Senate ruleskeeper, had meetings both on and off the Senate floor throughout the night. She would not divulge early Tuesday whether she’d support the bill.

“The sun is up, I’m going to go have a cup of coffee,” Murkowski told reporters.

Murkowski had backed an effort to soften an aggressive planned phase-out of subsidies for wind and solar projects under Trump’s tax-and-spending package.

The amendment sponsored by Republican Joni Ernst of Iowa would also do away with a proposed new excise tax the Senate bill would slap on wind and solar projects that use components from China and other “foreign entities of concern.”

Ernst, carrying donuts through the Capitol on Tuesday morning, said she didn’t think her amendment would ultimately get a vote. The change would risk displeasing fiscal conservatives who have insisted on the more stringent requirements to qualify for the tax credits.

“I don’t think they’re going to let us” bring up the amendment, she told reporters. “There’s a lot of stuff that went on over night, that kind of waylaid a lot of our plans.”

Another moderate holdout, Susan Collins of Maine, said she still has “reservations” about the bill after the Senate all-nighter.

Democrats, angered by the Medicaid cuts in the bill, voted to defeat a Collins amendment that would have doubled the rural hospital fund in the bill to $50 billion, in exchange for a tax increase on some of the highest-earning Americans.

As leaders continue to twist arms on the bill itself, they also need to ensure they have enough votes on a final “wraparound” amendment tweaking the legislation ahead of a vote on final passage. Republican aides workshopped that amendment with the parliamentarian to determine whether changes adhere to the chamber’s rules to pass the bill along party lines.

Part of the calculus for Senate leaders is to strip language that could threaten the bill’s odds in the House, which is planning to vote on the Senate measure later this week. The House’s own version of the bill passed by a single vote.

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