Big, Beautiful Bill Stalls in House, Endangering Cornerstone of Trump’s Legislative Agenda

The House of Representatives stalled out on the road to passing President Donald Trump’s big, beautiful bill Wednesday night.

After a chaotic day, which saw the House set a new record for the longest vote in its history, a second vote on the rule to allow a vote on final passage hit a snag.

After three hours, the vote was still open, with five Republicans joining all 212 Democrats in voting to block the big, beautiful bill from advancing — a total of 217.

Eight Republicans had yet to vote, with 207 voting yea. If Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) convinces all eight holdouts to vote for the rule, he will still need to flip a couple of the nay votes.

The five Republican nays are Reps. Andrew Clyde (R-GA), Brian Fitzpatrick (R-PA), Victoria Spartz (R-IN), Keith Self (R-TX), and Thomas Massie (R-KY) — who changed his vote from yea to nay while the voting was ongoing.

The eight yet to vote are Reps. Josh Brecheen (R-OK), Tim Burchett (R-TN), Eric Burlison (R-MO), Michael Cloud (R-TX), Mark Harris (R-TN), Bob Onder (R-MO), Scott Perry (R-PA), and Chip Roy (R-TX).

Getting to the rule was seen as a victory in itself after a chaotic scramble throughout Wednesday.

Before the rule vote, the House took a chaotic vote on a simple procedural fix. Over six hours later, when the vote finally closed, it was the longest in the history of the chamber.

Republican leadership left that vote open rather than moving directly to the rule vote. Initially, the vote remained open while perhaps several dozen Republicans not yet in town due to weather-related traveling problems filtered into Washington. But as the vote commenced, and several Republicans in the Capitol withheld their vote, it became clear Republicans would have a problem whipping additional votes for the day.

While that vote was open, around two dozen Republican holdouts and skeptics filtered in and out of a Capitol office across the hall from the House chamber, while others met in Johnson’s office. Those meetings were joined by a variety of leadership and administration figures, including Office of Management and Budget Director Russ Vought, Deputy Chief of Staff James Blair, and Director of Legislative Affairs James Braid.

Earlier in the day, multiple groups of House Republicans met at the White House with Trump.

Long after the tally on the procedural vote was sufficient to pass, the vote remained open to prevent moving directly to the rule vote.

The meetings with Trump, coupled with further negotiations throughout the day, clearly bore fruit. Skeptical Republicans began suggesting the Senate-passed bill was more aligned with their vision than previously thought.

Those meetings included “a lot of information that we found out we did not know,” Rep. Ralph Norman (R-SC) told a gaggle of reporters outside the meeting with holdouts. “And I think anybody in here will tell you the same thing.”

Enough progress was made that the House moved forward with the rule vote.

But more than three hours into that vote, it appears it might stay open overnight, and the new record for longest vote in the history of the House will be broken within hours of being set.

Once — or if — the rule passes, the House will begin an hour of debate. Afterward, House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY) will have the opportunity to speak for one minute.

But House practice allows each party’s leader to take as long as they want with their minute.

The longest “magic minute” speech was by former Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-CA), which lasted over eight hours.

Multiple reports on Wednesday said that Jeffries planned to use his magic minute for only about an hour. After he speaks, the House can vote on final passage of the big, beautiful bill.

But Jeffries’ reported plans for an hour-long speech were made when the vote on final passage was expected Wednesday. If this process bleeds further into Thursday, Jeffries could choose to give a McCarthy-length speech — or longer.

A filibuster-style speech could give the struggling Jeffries a boost with a Democrat base increasingly skeptical of his leadership, but more importantly, it could deny Trump the opportunity to hold his long-anticipated Independence Day bill signing ceremony.

Any Republican enabling Jeffries to do so would surely face Trump’s wrath.

The bill could pass early Thursday morning. But the longer the rule vote — and the big, beautiful bill’s passage — remains in the balance, the less likely the remarkable and unlikely coalition of support for the legislation Trump has assembled stays together.

Trump let loose on recalcitrant Republicans early Thursday morning amid the stakeout, showing the urgency of moving quickly.

The clock is ticking, and Trump will not forget those who let it strike midnight on his signature legislation.

Bradley Jaye is Deputy Political Editor for Breitbart News. Follow him on X/Twitter and Instagram @BradleyAJaye.