The United States Senate voted early Thursday morning to pass President Donald Trump’s (R) plan to cut $9 billion in federal spending.
Maine Sen. Susan Collins (R) and Alaska Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R) joined the Senate Democrats in opposition to the plan. All remaining Republicans voted in support of the cost-cutting plan, known as a rescission package, allowing it to pass the chamber by a margin of 51-48.
Democratic Sen. Tina Smith of Minnesota was not present at the vote due to hospitalization.
Kentucky Republican Sen. Mitch McConnell had opposed a procedural move Wednesday to advance the package, but he ultimately voted in support of the measure Thursday morning.
The House is expected to take up the Senate’s version of the rescission package Thursday.
According to the Bipartisan Policy Center, presidents don’t often seek rescission packages, but Congress regularly invokes them to reappropriate unspent funds.
White House’s Office of Management and Budget’s (OMB) rescission request started a 45-day clock for Congress to act.
A June 3rd thread on X posted by the OMB details a number of the initiatives that the White House sought to see defunded through this rescission package, including several LGBTQ-related programs in places like Uganda and the Western Balkans, as well as several million dollars worth of environmental programs throughout the world.
This post also highlights a proposed $4 million cut for legume systems research and $135 million for the World Health Organization.
One of the most talked about cuts included in the bill has been $1.1 billion previously allocated to the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, the organization responsible for distributing funding to local public radio and television stations.
Federal funding for NPR and PBS also comes through the Corporation for Public Broadcasting. According to the Washington Post, about 15 percent of PBS’ funding comes from the federal government, as well as around 1 percent of NPR’s funding.
Although some Republicans, including Sen. Collins and Sen. Murkowski, raised concerns about the funding cuts to the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, President Trump has strongly pushed back on the idea of stripping these reductions from the rescission package.
“It is very important that all Republicans adhere to my Recissions Bill and, in particular, DEFUND THE CORPORATION FOR PUBLIC BROADCASTING (PBS and NPR), which is worse than CNN & MSDNC put together,” Trump said in a Truth Social post last week. “Any Republican that votes to allow this monstrosity to continue broadcasting will not have my support or Endorsement. Thank you for your attention to this matter!”
The original package included cuts to the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR), but this provision was removed before making it out of the Senate, bringing the total value of the cuts from $9.4 billion to $9 billion.
Because of this, it will need to be reapproved by the House before it can be sent to the President’s desk for a signature.
Although a number of other amendments were introduced during the package’s “vote-a-rama” Wednesday, no other changes were made before the chamber voted narrowly in support of sending it back to the House for approval.
Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-SD) said that there was “a lot of interest among our members” in seeing the PEPFAR cuts removed and reportedly expressed hope that the House would be receptive to this change.
In order for these federal spending cuts to take effect, a final version of the rescission package approved by both the House and Senate must be on the President’s desk by Friday. Otherwise, the request will lapse, and federal spending will remain as is.
