The House Freedom Caucus is circulating a memo sharply criticizing the Senate-passed GOP megabill as Republican leaders work to secure hard-liners’ votes Wednesday.
The three-page document seizes on more than a dozen modifications to the bill made after it passed the House in May. Some, but not all, were due to Senate budget rules requiring the elimination of some provisions to sidestep a Democratic filibuster.
One issue that cannot be entirely attributed to decisions made by the Senate parliamentarian include the revised bill’s outsized deficit impact: “The bill violates the House framework of $1 of tax cuts for $1 of spending cuts (with 2.6% economic growth), increases the deficit by $761 billion without interest and more $1.3 trillion with interest after changes were made in base text and a wrap-around amendment was adopted,” the memo says. “This was not what Leader [John] Thune and Speaker [Mike] Johnson promised.”
