US House of Representatives approves Donald Trump’s budget law including tax cuts-Diepresse.com
This is now going to the Senate, where Republican senators have already announced that they want to make significant changes. There were protests in front of the Capitol in Washington.
The US representative house dominated by the Republicans voted on Thursday after a marathon session for a comprehensive budget law including tax cuts. The law, which is also controversial within the party of President Donald Trump, thus an important parliamentary hurdle. It now goes to the Senate, where Republican senators have already announced that they want to make significant changes. There were protests in front of the Capitol in Washington.
The budgetary law described by Trump as « large, beautiful law » provides for an extension of the massive tax cuts from its first term (2017-21), which would expire at the end of the year. To compensate for the resulting budget deficit, massive reductions in health insurance Medicaid and food aids are planned.
Millions of loss of health insurance threatened
According to the U.S. Congress’s independent budget office, more than ten million US citizens would lose their health insurance as a result of the law. According to independent observers, tax cuts would also increase the state deficit by $ 4.8 trillion (4.3 trillion euros) over the course of a decade.
Both more moderate and more conservative Republican MPs had meanwhile stood against the draft law. MP Ralph Norman from the US state of South Carolina called for more radical « real cuts ».
« A defeat is simply not an option, » said the chairman of the House of Representatives, Republican Mike Johnson, before the vote. He had initially set a deadline for the vote until the Memorial Day holiday next Monday, but then took the nightly coordination out of worry that there could be no more MPs in Washington towards the end of the week.
