Donald Trump’s “big, beautiful bill” narrowly passed the House Thursday morning, but not without a few last-minute blowups.
The president spent Tuesday and Wednesday making personal visits to holdouts from the far-right House Freedom Caucus, with one member in particular catching Trump’s ire, according to NOTUS.
Things got especially tense during a Wednesday afternoon meeting between Trump and Freedom Caucus Chair Andy Harris, who that morning told Newsmax the bill had gotten “worse overnight” and there was “no way [it] passes today.”
While meeting with Harris, the president allegedly began a rant that devolved into yelling and cursing at the Maryland representative, eventually telling him, “You’re stupid if you vote against this bill.”
Harris ultimately voted “present.”
After meeting with Trump, several of the other Republican rebels began calling for a 10-day delay on the vote. Elsewhere in the Capitol, Speaker of the House Mike Johnson later said he “got on [his] knees and prayed” they would change their minds.
Things reportedly got especially tense during a Wednesday afternoon meeting between Trump and Freedom Caucus Chair Andy Harris, who that morning told Newsmax the bill had gotten “worse overnight” and there was “no way [it] passes today.”
While meeting with Harris, the president allegedly began a rant that devolved into yelling and cursing at the Maryland representative, eventually telling him, “You’re stupid if you vote against this bill.” Harris ultimately voted “present.”
In the end, Republicans barely managed to pass the bill, eking out 215 “yea” votes against 214 “nays.”
However, one GOP member told NOTUS that even after their meeting with Trump, key Republican holdouts were still exploring their options for tanking the bill, reaching out to House members who had expressed skepticism in an attempt to solidify more “nay” votes.
A spokesperson for the Freedom Caucus later denied those allegations, telling NOTUS: “Freedom Caucus Members are the biggest supporters of the President, and I am unaware of any of that going on.”
Just before the vote, Harris and his fellow holdouts did manage to secure a few changes to the bill, including moving up the date by which able-bodied Medicaid recipients must meet certain work requirements by more than two years, from January 2029 to December 2026.
However, the final version of the bill left out many of the rebels’ goals on cutting and restricting Medicaid. While Harris had pushed for per capita caps on Medicaid and changes to the Federal Medical Assistance Percentage, the formula that determines the federal government’s contributions to Medicaid coverage, neither provision made it into the final bill.
After the vote, Harris told Politico that he’d met with executive branch staff “through the night,” and had been assured there would be further “executive order efforts” to “tighten fraud, waste, and abuse of Medicaid.”
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