WASHINGTON — The Senate passed its massive reconciliation package on Tuesday after a marathon voting session, securing a major win for Republicans and placing the party one step closer to enacting President Donald Trump’s agenda.
Lawmakers voted 51-50 largely along party lines to advance the megabill containing Trump’s policies on border, energy, national defense and tax reform, overcoming weeks of closed-door negotiations and internal disagreements. The package — known by Republicans as the “One Big Beautiful Bill Act” — now heads to the House for consideration as GOP leaders race to approve the changes made by the Senate and deliver the tax bill to Trump’s desk for his signature by the Fourth of July.
“The Big Beautiful Bill delivers for Utahns. It secures the border, provides permanent tax relief for working families, and strengthens our military,” Utah Sen. John Curtis, R-Utah, said in a statement. “I’m grateful to Leader Thune and Finance Chair Crapo for including my changes to the energy credits—key for business certainty and for Utah’s energy future. I look forward to the House sending it to the President before the Fourth."
Utah Sen. Mike Lee also voted in favor of the bill.
Senate leaders spent weeks mulling over the provisions passed by their colleagues in the House, but many of the most contentious policies were not settled until hours before the full legislation was passed. Even then, Republicans relied on Vice President JD Vance as the tiebreaking vote after three GOP senators bucked party leadership to oppose the measure.
Throughout the night, GOP leaders huddled with four key defectors as they sought to strike a deal with any one of them. By flipping just one, it brought the margin to 50-50, forcing Vance to break the tie.
Three of the holdouts included Sens. Thom Tillis, R-N.C., Susan Collins, R-Maine, and Rand Paul, R-Ky.
The remaining dissenter, Sen. Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, struck a last-minute deal with leaders, ultimately flipping her vote to salvage the megabill.
Even in the closing hours of the prolonged vote-a-rama, details of what the package would actually look like were unclear until Senate leaders dropped their wrap-around amendment — the final provision considered that contains several last-minute changes and is unknown to most lawmakers before it’s brought to the floor.
The wide-ranging amendment bundled significant changes to policies on green energy, Medicaid, and other tax-related provisions to solidify the remaining swing votes to support the package. The negotiations largely focused on where Congress should approve spending cuts in order to pay for the $4.5 trillion in tax cut extensions that will be approved in the reconciliation bill.
Here’s a breakdown of the agreements at the center of the vote-a-rama and how Republicans pulled off a victory:
Murkowski won over by Alaska exemptions
Republican leaders were sent into a flurry late Monday night after the parliamentarian struck down a provision offering an enhanced Medicaid matching rate for Alaska, a measure aimed at shielding Murkowski’s home state from steep spending cuts. The parliamentarian concluded the language did not comply with budgetary rules allowing the Senate to skirt a 60-vote filibuster.
That ruling dropped late Monday night, shifting Murkowski into the defector crowd and setting off a scramble among GOP leadership to secure the votes needed to pass the bill.
Republicans scrambled to include some version of that provision in the workaround amendment, but it was once again shot down by the parliamentarian.
However, GOP leaders managed to secure a crucial addition to the bill that carved out similar exceptions for Alaska and Hawaii for cuts to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program.
The reconciliation package includes language to make states pay for part of the SNAP benefits for the first time — but the bill would exempt the two states from paying hundreds of millions of dollars in costs.
The amendment would also delay SNAP work requirements for states with error rates above 13%, which would benefit Alaska.
Those SNAP provisions appeared to be enough to satisfy Murkowski, who voted in favor of the bill.
Collins votes down bill over rural hospitals language
One of the most contentious proposals included language seeking to crack down on state provider taxes, which are taxes placed by states on medical providers like hospitals and clinics that then boost reimbursement from the federal government. The Senate would incrementally reduce that tax from the current 6% down to 3.5%, but those cuts would not start until 2028 to ease concerns among lawmakers from states they say rely on that tax to provide money for health coverage.
As a result, Senate Republicans added a $50 billion stabilization fund to go toward rural hospitals over the next five years to offset the Medicaid cuts tucked elsewhere in the bill. However, that was less than Collins’s original request for $100 billion.
Collins introduced an amendment during the vote-a-rama to add a $50 billion stabilization fund, proposing to raise tax rates for individuals making $25 million and couples making $50 million to offset those costs. That amendment was rejected on the floor, prompting Collins to threaten to vote against the bill.
Paul objects over debt ceiling increase
Additionally, the Senate version includes language to raise the debt limit to $5 trillion, even higher than the $4 trillion ceiling proposed by the House. Paul has long objected to any language related to raising the debt ceiling, prompting him to vote against the full package.
Other changes: Green energy tax credits
The Senate version of the bill also makes changes to House Republicans’ efforts to fully repeal Biden-era green energy tax credits, slightly delaying the phaseout of some programs.
One of the most major changes would require solar and wind generation programs to begin service by the end of 2027 to qualify for the clean electricity production and investment tax credits previously approved by the Inflation Reduction Act in 2021. That change establishes a hard deadline for the tax credits to be phased out rather than operating under a case-by-case basis.
Republicans also initially tucked in language that would implement strict rules requiring developers to prove they are not relying on materials from China or other “prohibited foreign entities.” If companies fail to do so, they would have been levied excise taxes beginning in 2027.
Curtis filed an amendment to ease those guidelines, although that measure did not get a vote on the floor.
However, the wraparound amendment nixed that language from the bill to remove the excise tax altogether.
The Senate text also appears to change the timeline for tax credits incentivizing the usage of electric vehicles, phasing those out by Sept. 30 — months earlier than the original proposal to terminate the credits six months after passage. That change was made to satisfy fiscal conservatives in the House, who have been pushing for immediate termination.
Package heads to House, where it could face more problems
The “One Big Beautiful Bill Act” now heads to the House for consideration as GOP leaders sprint to get the legislation approved before Friday. However, that could be easier said than done as some fiscal conservatives in the House have vocally criticized changes made by the Senate — possibly putting the vote in peril with Republicans’ slim margins.
The House could reconvene as early as Wednesday to begin advancing the bill, but it’s not yet clear when a final vote may be scheduled.