It flew a bit under the radar on Wednesday, but the House approved a measure that, in addition to setting up Thursday’s vote on the rescissions packages sent over by the White House, also performed some clean-up (“a Byrd bath”) of the “One Big Beautiful Bill” (OBBB) as the Senate continues to work on it.
In a 213-207 vote, with Thomas Massie (R-KY) being the lone Republican “no” vote, the House approved several tweaks to the OBBB in order to avoid its getting held up due to parliamentary irregularities.
Okay, so what exactly did they do, and why?
House GOP leaders moved to make the changes after the Senate parliamentarian scrubbed through the legislation — a procedure known as the “Byrd bath” — and identified provisions and language that do not comply with the strict rules for the budget reconciliation process, which the GOP trifecta is using to circumvent a Democratic filibuster in the Senate and approve the bill by a simple majority.
Leaving the legislation as it was risked the parliamentarian ruling that it was not compliant, which would have resulted in the threshold for passage in the Senate increasing from a simple majority to 60 votes — allowing Democratic opposition to block it.
The changes to the Trump agenda bill — officially titled the One Big Beautiful Bill Act — pertain to defense funding, energy policy and changes to Medicaid.
For defense, Republicans nixed $2 billion for the enhancement of military intelligence programs; $500 million for the development, procurement and integration of maritime mines; and $62 million to convert Ohio-class submarine tubes to accept additional missiles.
On the energy front, meanwhile, the changes removed a provision that would have reinstated leases for a proposed copper and nickel mine that had been renewed under the first Trump administration but revoked under former President Biden. The mine would have been near an area known as the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness, a nature preserve that contains canoe routes and species including black bears, moose and foxes.
Now that the tweaks have been made, the House will formally forward the (New and Improved!) OBB to the Senate so they can continue to work on it. The goal there is to have the Senate vote on it prior to July 4, but there remains a fair amount of skepticism that it will get done quite that soon.
