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President Donald Trump wants his big, beautiful bill of tax breaks and spending cuts on his desk to be signed into law by the Fourth of July, and he’s pushing the slow-rolling Senate to make it happen sooner rather than later. Trump met with Senate Majority Leader John Thune at the White House early this week and has been dialing senators for one-on-one chats, using both the carrot and stick to nudge, badger and encourage them to act. But it’s still a long road ahead for the 1,000-page-plus package. His question to me was, How do you think the bill’s going to go in the Senate? Sen. Josh Hawley, R-Mo., said about his call with Trump. Do you think there’s going to be problems? It’s a potentially tumultuous three-week sprint for senators preparing to put their own imprint on the massive Republican package that cleared the House late last month by a single vote. The senators have been meeting for weeks behind closed doors, including as they returned to Washington late Monday, to revise the package ahead of what is expected to be a similarly narrow vote in the Senate. Passing THE ONE, BIG, BEAUTIFUL BILL is a Historic Opportunity to turn our Country around, Trump posted on social media. He urged them Monday to work as fast as they can to get this Bill to MY DESK before the Fourth of JULY. Thune, like House Speaker Mike Johnson, has few votes to spare from the Senate’s slim, 53-seat GOP majority. Democrats are waging an all-out political assault on GOP proposals to cut Medicaid, food stamps and green energy investments to help pay for more than $4.5 trillion in tax cuts with many lawmakers being hammered at boisterous town halls back home. Itd be nice if we could have everybody on board to do it, but, you know, individual members are going to stake out their positions, Thune said Tuesday. But in the end, we have to succeed. Failures not an option. Weve got to get to 51. So well figure out the path forward to do that over the next couple of weeks. At its core, the package seeks to extend the tax cuts approved in 2017, during Trump’s first term at the White House, and add new ones the presidents campaigned on, including no taxes on tips and others. It also includes a massive build-up of $350 billion for border security, deportations and national security. To defray the lost tax revenue to the government and avoid piling onto the nation’s $36 trillion debt load, Republicans want reduce federal spending by imposing work requirements for some Americans who rely on government safety net services. Estimates are 8.6 million people would no longer have health care and nearly 4 million would lose Supplemental Nutritional Assistance Program benefits, known as SNAP. The package also would raise the nation’s debt limit by $4 trillion to allow more borrowing to pay the bills. Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer said Trump’s bill “is ugly to its very core. Schumer said Tuesday it’s a lie that the cuts won’t hurt Americans. Behind the smoke and mirrors lies a cruel and draconian truth: tax breaks for the ultra-wealthy paid for by gutting health care for millions of Americans,” said the New York senator. The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office is expected to soon provide an overall analysis of the package’s impacts on the government balance sheets, particular its rising annual deficits. But Republicans are ready to blast those findings from the congressional scorekeeper as flawed. Trump Tuesday switched to tougher tactics, deriding the holdout Republican senators to get on board. The president laid into Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul, the libertarian-leaning deficit hawk who has made a career of arguing against government spending. Paul wants the package’s $4 trillion increase to the debt ceiling out of the bill. Rand votes NO on everything, but never has any practical or constructive ideas. His ideas are actually crazy (losers!). Trump posted. The July 4th deadline is not only aspirational for the president, it’s all but mandatory for his Treasury Department. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent has warned Congress that the nation will run out of money to pay its bills if the debt ceiling, now at $36 trillion, is not lifted by mid-July or early August to allow more borrowing. Bessent has also been meeting behind closed doors with senators and GOP leadership. Thune acknowledged Tuesday that lifting the debt ceiling is not up for debate. Its got to be done, the South Dakota senator said. The road ahead is also a test for Thune who, like Johnson, is a newer leader in Congress and among the many Republicans adjusting their own priorities with Trump’s return to the White House. While Johnson has warned against massive changes to the package, Thune faces demands from his senators for adjustments. To make most of the tax cuts permanent particularly the business tax breaks that are the Senate priorities senators may shave some of Trump’s proposed new tax breaks on automobile loans or overtime pay, which are policies less prized by some senators. There are also discussions about altering the $40,000 cap that the House proposed for state and local deductions, known as SALT, which are important to lawmakers in high-tax New York, California and other states, but less so among GOP senators. We’re having all those discussions, said Sen. Thom Tillis, R-N.C., another key voice in the debate. Hawley is a among a group of senators, including Maine Sen. Susan Collins and Alaska Sen. Lisa Murkowski, who have raisd concerns about the Medicaid changes that could boot people from health insurance. A potential copay of up to $35 for Medicaid services that was part of the House package, as well as a termination of a provider tax that many states rely on to help fund rural hospitals, have also raised concerns. The best way to not be accused of cutting Medicaid is to not cut Medicaid, Hawley said. Collins said she is reviewing the details. There’s also a House provision that would allow the auction of spectrum bandwidth that some senators oppose. Lisa Mascaro and Mary Clare Jalonick, Associated Press Associated Press writer Matt Brown contributed to this report.
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Immigration, which has dominated the headlines since in the United States since President Donald Trump kicked off his second term this January, is also making headlines in Europe. On Tuesday in the Netherlands, Prime Minister Dick Schoof stepped down after the leader of the country’s far-right party, Geert Wilders, withdrew his party from the ruling coalition over disputes about asylum and immigration, effectively causing the Dutch government’s collapse and triggering new snap elections, according to the Guardian. The government collapse comes a few weeks before a major NATO summit in The Hague, and marks the unraveling of a multi-party coalition made up of: Wilders’ anti-Islam Freedom party (PVV), the Farmer-Citizens Movement (BBB), the centrist New Social Contract (NSC), and the Peoples Party for Freedom and Democracy (VVD). “We had agreed that the Netherlands would become the strictest (on immigration) in Europe, but were trailing somewhere near the bottom,” Wilders said, according to Reuters. “I intend to become the next prime minister. I am going to make the PVV bigger than ever.” As the news service pointed out, it remains to be seen if Wilders’ bold move will lead to his election, or backfire. In 2023, Wilders’ PVV actually won by a landslide in the general election, but the four major parties that created the coalition picked Dick Schoof as prime minister, leading longtime Prime Minister Mark Rutte, of the Peoples Party for Freedom and Democracy, to step down from the post. At that time, the disputes were over immigration, just as they are today. Last Monday, Wilders’ PVV announced a 10-point plan to reduce immigration that would effectively slash migration, temporarily halt asylum seekers who were granted refugee status from reuniting with families, and place soldiers at borders to turn away asylum-seekers. At issue are Syrians who are in the Netherlands as a result of the violence in their home country. The question many political analysts are now asking: Is this another example that Europe is shifting toward the right, as seen by Poland’s recent election? On Sunday, voters elected conservative nationalist Karol Nawrocki as that country grapples with the E.U.’s second-highest fiscal deficit, and weighs Ukraine’s future as a NATO member state.
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South Koreas main conservative candidate Kim Moon Soo has conceded defeat in the presidential election. Kim, the candidate of the People Power Party, told a news conference early Wednesday that he humbly accepts [the] peoples choice and congratulates his liberal rival Lee Jae-myung for winning the election. Kim spoke as voter turnouts and media projections showed Lee was expected to win the election to succeed Yoon Suk Yeol, a conservative who was removed from office in April over his ill-fated brief imposition of martial law. THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. APs earlier story follows below. South Koreas liberal opposition candidate Lee Jae-myung was expected to win an early presidential election on Tuesday, vote counts and media projections suggested. The victory would cap months of political turmoil triggered by the stunning but brief imposition of martial law by the now ousted conservative leader Yoon Suk Yeol. It was unclear whether Lees election would cause any major, immediate shift in South Koreas foreign policy. Lee, previously accused by critics of tilting toward China and North Korea and away from the U.S. and Japan, has repeatedly stressed South Korea’s alliance with the U.S. as the foundation of its foreign policy. The toughest external challenges awaiting a new president are U.S. President Donald Trumps tariff policy and North Koreas advancing nuclear program. But experts say whoever becomes president in South Korea can’t do much to secure major progress in South Koreas favor on those issues. With 73% of ballots counted as of 1 a.m. Wednesday, Lee, the Democratic Party candidate, led with more than 48% of the votes, trailed by main conservative People Power Party candidate Kim Moon Soo with 42.9%. South Koreas major media outlets were analyzing that Lees victory was certain. The exit poll by South Koreas three major television stationsKBS, MBC, and SBSearlier showed Lee projected to obtain 51.7% of total votes cast, beating Kim with 39.3%. Preelection surveys suggested Lee appeared headed for an easy win, riding on deep public frustration over the conservatives in the wake of Yoons martial law debacle that plunged South Korea into political turmoil. With the vote counting still underway, its premature to say anything definitively, but if the results stand as they are now, I pay my respects to the great decision of our people, Lee said outside his apartment in Incheon, just west of Seoul, as his supporters shouted his name. Hundreds of Lee supporters separately gathered outside the National Assembly in Seoul, waving Korean flags and singing. Nearly 80% of the countrys 44.4 million eligible voters cast ballots, according to an interim tally. Thats one of the highest turnouts for a presidential election in South Korea, reflecting public eagerness to move past the political turmoil. The winning candidate will immediately be sworn in as president Wednesday for a single, full term of five years without the typical two-month transition period. Pragmatic diplomacy Lee, who served as governor of Gyeonggi province and mayor of Seongnam city, has been a highly divisive figure in politics for years. As a former child laborer known for his inspirational rags-to-riches story, Lee came to fame through biting criticism of the countrys conservative establishment and calls to build a more assertive South Korea in foreign policy. That rhetoric has given him an image as someone who can institute sweeping reforms and fix the countrys deep-seated economic inequality and corruption. His critics view him as a dangerous populist who relies on political division and backpedals on promises too easily. On foreign policy, Lee has has steadfastly vowed to pursue pragmatic diplomacy. He has promised to solidify a trilateral Seoul-Washington-Tokyo partnership, a stance that isn’t much different from the position held by South Koreas conservatives. He said he would pursue better ties with North Korea but acknowledged that it would be very difficult to realize a summit with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un anytime soon. This signals Lee won’t likely initiate any drastic steps meant to improve relations with North Korea. Experts say there arent many diplomatic options for South Korea as it tries to address Trumps tariff hikes and calls for South Korea to pay more for the cost of the U.S. military presence, as well as North Koreas headlong pursuit of nuclear weapons. Experts say that has made both Lee and Kim Moon Soo avoid unveiling ambitious foreign policy goals. Paik Wooyeal, a professor at Seouls Yonsei University, said foreign policy strategists for Lee understand there isnt much South Korea can do to bring about a denuclearization of North Korea. Paik said Lee also doesnt share the Korean nationalistic zeal held by ex-liberal President Moon Jae-in, who met Kim Jong Un three times during his 2017-22 term. Impact of tariff hikes Lees government still could become engaged in a little bit of friction with the Trump administration, while a Kim Moon Soo government, which prioritizes relations with Washington, would likely offer more concessions to the U.S., said Chung Jin-young, a former dean of the Graduate School of Pan-Pacific International Studies at South Koreas Kyung Hee University. Chung predicted Lee wont be able to pursue overly drastic steps on foreign policy and security, given the countrys foreign exchange and financial markets are vulnerable to such changes. Lee has preached patience over Trumps tariff policy, arguing it would be a mistake to rush negotiations in pursuit of an early agreement with Washington. Kim Moon Soo has said he would meet with Trump as soon as possible. On Monday, South Korean trade officials held an emergency meeting to discuss a response to Trumps announcement that the U.S. will raise tariffs on steel and aluminum products to 50% beginning Wednesday. South Koreas central bank last week sharply lowered its 2025 growth outlook to 0.8%, citing the potential impact of Trumps tariff hikes and weak domestic demand worsened by the political turmoil of past months. Healing domestic divide The election serves as another defining moment in the countrys resilient democracy, but observers worry a domestic divide that worsened after Yoons martial law stunt is far from over and could pose a big political burden n the new president. The past six months saw large crowds of people rallying in the streets to either denounce or support Yoon, while a leadership vacuum caused by Yoons impeachment and ensuing formal dismissal rattled the countrys high-level diplomatic activities and financial markets. Lee has promised to heal the national split, but his vow to thoroughly hold those involved in Yoon’s martial law stunt accountable has sparked concerns that he would use investigations to launch political retaliations against his opponents. In a Facebook posting earlier Tuesday, Lee called for voters to deliver a stern and resolute judgement against the conservatives over martial law. In a campaign speech Monday, Lee claimed that a win by Kim Moon Soo would mean the return of the rebellion forces, the destruction of democracy and the deprival of peoples human rights. Kim, a former labor minister under Yoon, said that a Lee win would allow him to wield excessive power. Lee is now trying to seize all power in South Korea, Kim told one rally. By Hyung-Jin Kim and Kim Tong-Hyung, Associated Press
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