President Donald Trump and his top deputies have started their final public push to get the “big, beautiful bill” over the finish line as the Senate struggles to finish up the legislation.
Stephen Miller, Trump’s top policy aide, appeared on Fox News Channel’s “Hannity” Monday night, about 12 hours into the Senate “vote-a-rama,” to angrily rebut criticisms of the bill and fiercely defend its contents.
“I am sick and tired of the lies about this bill that have been perpetrated by the opportunists who are trying to make a name for themselves,” he said. “This is the most conservative bill of my lifetime.”
Around that time, White House budget director Russ Vought took apparent aim at deficit hawks concerned about the expanding costs of the Senate version of the megabill in an X post. He embraced the Senate’s “current policy baseline” accounting, zeroing out the cost of extending the 2017 Trump tax cuts.
“Remember, those saying that the Senate bill increases deficits are comparing it to a projection where spending is eternal, and tax relief sunsets,” he said. “That is a Leftist presupposition, and thankfully the Senate refused to let the bill be scored that way.”
Shortly before midnight, Vice President JD Vance also weighed in on X, arguing that the megabill’s border security and immigration provisions alone made it worthwhile.
“Everything else — the CBO score, the proper baseline, the minutiae of the Medicaid policy — is immaterial compared to the ICE money and immigration enforcement provisions,” he wrote.
Then, at 12:01 a.m., Trump himself posted to Truth Social: “Republicans, the One Big Beautiful Bill, perhaps the greatest and most important of its kind in history, gives the largest Tax Cuts and Border Security ever, Jobs by the Millions, Military/Vets increases, and so much more. The failure to pass means a whopping 68% Tax increase, the largest in history!!!”
Meanwhile, the Senate kept voting, with no final deal yet in sight.
