The GOP-led Senate passed a budget blueprint closely aligned with President Donald Trump’s legislative agenda, which includes a permanent extension of his 2017 tax cuts and $175 billion in new border security spending.
The resolution passed 51 to 48, with Republican Senators Rand Paul of Kentucky and Susan Collins of Maine joining Senate Democrats in opposing the measure. The blueprint was approved at around 2:30 a.m. after a marathon “vote-a-rama” session, during which Senate Democrats compelled their Republican colleagues to vote on a series of politically charged amendments related to entitlement spending, government efficiency measures, and Trump’s tariffs.
Senate Republicans pointed out that, despite claims by Democrats, the upcoming tax and spending bill—which will be unlocked once the budget resolution is passed by both chambers—won’t cut Americans’ Medicaid or Medicare benefits. They are pushing to advance Trump’s legislative agenda through budget reconciliation, a process that lets Senate Republicans bypass the filibuster and pass legislation with a simple majority vote.
“The argument is going to be made that we’re going to hurt all kinds of different people tonight in different ways,” Idaho Republican Sen. Mike Crapo said on the Senate floor Friday evening. “But the reality is that’s not going to happen. The President has been very clear any reforms to Medicare or Medicaid must not reduce patient benefits.”
No amendments proposed by Senate Democrats were specifically focused on border security or expediting the president’s deportation agenda, the Daily Caller reported.
Paul voted against the budget resolution, arguing that it included a $5 trillion increase in the statutory debt limit—a move he contended would set a record for the largest borrowing in a single bill in recent American history.
“If we expand the debt at $5 trillion that will be an expansion of the debt equal to or exceeding everything that happened in the Biden years,” Paul said on the Senate floor Friday. “Republicans who vote for this will be on record as being more fiscally liberal than their counterparts. They will vote to borrow more money than the Democrats have ever borrowed.”
The nonpartisan Committee for a Responsible Budget found that the Senate’s bill, if not amended in any way, will add up to $5.8 trillion to the deficit, which the organization said would be “historically unprecedented in its fiscal irresponsibility.”
Senate GOP leadership contends that the bill’s low spending reduction floors grant the upper chamber maximum flexibility to meet the requirements of the budget reconciliation process.
However, some deficit-conscious House Republicans doubt that senators are genuinely committed to reducing spending and have vowed to oppose the resolution unless its text is amended.
“If the Senate can deliver real deficit reduction in line with or greater than the House goals, I can support the Senate budget resolution,” House Freedom Caucus Chairman Andy Harris said in a statement Saturday. “However, by the Senate setting committee instructions so low at $4 billion compared to the House’s $1.5 to $2 trillion, I am unconvinced that will happen. The Senate is free to put pen to paper to draft its reconciliation bill, but I can’t support House passage of the Senate changes to our budget resolution until I see the actual spending and deficit reduction plans to enact President Trump’s America First agenda.”
“The Senate response was unserious and disappointing, creating $5.8 trillion in new costs and a mere $4 billion in enforceable cuts, less than one day’s worth of borrowing by the federal government,” House Budget Committee Chairman Jodey Arrington said in a statement Saturday morning.
The original House budget resolution did not incorporate permanent tax relief—a stance unacceptable to most Senate Republicans and the president.
To address this, Senate Republicans included a permanent extension of Trump’s 2017 tax cuts in their fiscal framework. They used a budget scoring method that assumes the permanent extension will have a deficit-neutral effect, as the forthcoming bill would merely continue existing policies.
“Americans should not have to live in fear of a tax hike every few years,” Thune said in a speech on the floor Thursday.