But first: Contributing pundits debate the question of why Silicon Valley tech and social media has embraced MAGA and President Trump. Rich Corbett comments in the right column and Ken Zino comments on the left.
House Framework Is In – Serious resistance to President Trump’s “big, beautiful” budget package came not from moderate Republicans, but from the hard-core right.
Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA), said the House is going to deliver all of Trump’s America First agenda, CQ Roll Call reports.
“We’re going to deliver all of it, not just part of it,” Johnson said, “and this is the first step in that process.”
One über-conservative holdout, Rep. Tim Burchett (R-TN) told NPR’s Leila Fadel on Morning Edition why it took a call from the president to flip his vote for the budget package, which passed 217-215; $36-trillion worth of federal debt. Johnson had no margin for a single Republican defection.
Burkett said his priorities are tax cuts, a closed border and deregulation. An $880-billion cut in Medicaid and Medicare will not affect the programs’ delivery of benefits, but rather will force the House Energy and Commerce Committee to find waste, fraud and abuse in their budgets, he said.
“The problem is it’s Washington, ma’am,” Burchett told Fadel. “It’s a dishonest community to its core.”
Details … The budget framework allows for up to $4.5 trillion in tax cuts extended from Trump’s first term plus new tax breaks, provided Congress can find $2 trillion in federal spending to cut for the coming decade, according to Roll Call. The framework calls for raising Congress’ borrowing limit to $4 trillion and adds up to $200 billion in border security funding and defense spending.
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Trump's Gaza -- President Trump has posted a "madcap" AI video on Instagram promoting "what's next" for Gaza, Politico reports. Hint: Think golden Trump Casino Gaza on the Middle East's Riviera, replete with kids holding golden Trump-head balloons, Teslas roaming the streets and Trump and Benjamin Netanyahu in bathing suits sipping drinks on the beach.
--Compiled and edited by Todd Lassa