Conservatives imperil GOP megabill that would fulfill Trump's agenda

Washington: Conservatives on the House Budget Committee on Friday blocked their party's megabill from reaching the floor, citing concerns that the legislation to fulfill President Donald Trump's domestic agenda would add too much to the deficit.

It was a remarkable revolt that threatened to upend the party's drive to push the legislation through the House before a Memorial Day recess, and sent Republican leaders scrambling to try to put down the uprising.

Five Republicans -- Reps. Chip Roy of Texas, Ralph Norman of South Carolina, Josh Brecheen of Oklahoma, Andrew Clyde of Georgia and Lloyd Smucker of Pennsylvania -- joined Democrats in voting against the legislation. The vote was 16-21.

"This bill falls profoundly short; it does not do what we say it does with respect to deficits," Roy said. "Deficits will go up in the first half of the 10-year budget window, and we all know it's true, and we shouldn't do that. We shouldn't say that we're doing something we're not doing."

The bill would make Trump's 2017 tax cuts permanent and eliminate taxes on tips and overtime pay through 2028, fulfilling a campaign pledge. Cuts to Medicaid, food stamps and subsidies for clean energy would partly offset the roughly $3.8 trillion cost of those tax measures over 10 years, as well as increased spending on the military and immigration enforcement.

But the conservatives are demanding changes to the bill, arguing that their leaders did not go far enough to cut federal spending. The Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget, a nonpartisan group that calls for lower deficits, estimated that the bill would add roughly $3.3 trillion to the deficit over the next decade.

Chief among their frustrations is that a measure imposing work requirements on childless Medicaid recipients without disabilities would not kick in until 2029.

"We're telling a healthy body, a healthy American, that you've got four years to get a job," Norman said.

They are also unhappy that the legislation does not immediately eliminate a slew of clean energy tax credits that were created by President Joe Biden's Inflation Reduction Act.

Both of those measures were written in an effort to split the difference between the conservatives who have been clamoring for deep cuts to Medicaid and the clean energy tax credits, and the more centrist Republicans who say their constituents depend on both programs.

Politically vulnerable Republicans in particular have warned that voting for a measure that would ax widely used federal programs would be politically toxic.