Senate Advances Trump's "Big and Beautiful" Bill Amid Republican Divisions

The United States Senate has passed a procedural motion to advance a significant tax and spending bill, dubbed the "Big and Beautiful" by President Donald Trump. The motion, which passed by a vote of 51 to 49, allows for the Senate to begin debating the bill. This process includes reading, debating, and voting on the legislation, which will then need to be approved by the House of Representatives.

The Senate majority leader, a Republican, has expressed uncertainty about whether the bill will receive enough support from fellow Republicans to pass. Republicans hold 53 of the 100 Senate seats, but two Republican senators voted against the procedural motion, leading to threats from Trump to take action against them.

The Senate minority leader, a Democrat, has announced that Democrats will insist on a full reading of the 940-page bill, even if it takes all night. Typically, the Senate skips the reading process to save time, but Democrats are using this procedural tactic to delay the bill's progress. Senate staff estimate that reading the entire 940-page bill will take approximately 15 hours. In 2021, a similar tactic was used by Republicans to delay the reading of a 628-page bill, which took 10 hours and 44 minutes to read.

The House of Representatives initially passed the "Big and Beautiful" bill by a narrow margin in May. The bill aims to extend tax cuts for businesses and individuals implemented during Trump's first term, provide new tax breaks for car loans, increase defense spending, and allocate more funds to combat illegal immigration. It also seeks to repeal clean energy incentives introduced by Joseph Biden and reduce certain healthcare services.

The Senate version of the bill, which has been reduced from over 1,100 pages to 940 pages, removes provisions that would limit immigrants' access to medical assistance and expand the powers of immigration enforcement agencies. However, the Senate version still targets Biden's clean energy incentives by eliminating subsidies for consumers purchasing electric vehicles, rooftop solar panels, and energy-efficient appliances. Additionally, the bill imposes extra taxes on companies using foreign materials for wind and solar energy projects.

Democratic senators have criticized the bill, with one senator calling it a "death sentence" for green energy and a "massacre" of the clean energy industry. Industry experts predict that the bill could increase the cost of wind and solar energy projects by 10% to 20%.

Elon Musk, the CEO of Tesla, criticized the bill on social media, stating that it would destroy millions of jobs in the U.S. and cause significant harm to the country. Musk also pointed out that the bill raises the debt ceiling by 5 trillion dollars, the largest increase in history, which could lead the U.S. down a path of debt servitude. Musk has previously criticized the bill and had a falling out with Trump over it. Trump, however, has strongly supported the bill and set a deadline of July 4 for its passage, with Republicans controlling both chambers of Congress.