President Donald Trump’s “One Big Beautiful Bill Act” is running into hurdles as Republicans in Congress try to get the sweeping tax and policy measure to the president by his preferred July 4 deadline.
The U.S. Senate was expected to start voting as soon as Friday on its version of the massive proposal that seeks to extend Trump’s 2017 tax cuts. The budget bill squeaked through the House by one vote in May.
But Republicans in the Senate were forced to rewrite sections Thursday after the chamber’s parliamentarian ruled that several attempts to offset tax cuts could not be included under rules that the majority party is trying to use to pass the spending plan by a simple majority.
The bill, which may add more than $2 trillion to the federal deficit over a decade and leave millions more uninsured while extending tax cuts, is facing a skeptical public. A University of New Hampshire poll released Wednesday found fewer than a third of Mainers want Congress to pass the bill.
Here are a few ways Trump’s megabill would affect Maine.
Maine hospitals expect ‘significant financial challenges.’
The parliamentarian’s ruling struck the Medicaid provider tax that Republicans hoped to cap to save billions alongside their still-proposed work requirements. The Congressional Budget Office said it may cause millions to lose their health insurance and cut $300 billion in Medicaid spending over a decade.
The cap would starkly hit Maine’s rural hospitals. That’s because states use the current 6 percent provider tax to draw down federal dollars that they can funnel back to providers to help them care for Medicaid patients. The cap would have generated hundreds of billions of dollars in savings to help pay for a permanent extension of Trump’s 2017 tax cuts.
A few Republicans, such as U.S. Sens. Susan Collins of Maine and Josh Hawley of Missouri, warned the provision would shutter rural hospitals in their states that rely on Medicaid funding. The provider tax changes alleviate those concerns to some degree, but health care advocates in Maine still have other worries over what may make it into the final bill.
Gov. Janet Mills urged Maine’s congressional delegation Thursday to oppose the megabill and noted an “independent review” provided to the state found the Senate version could result in a $5.9 billion cut over 10 years to a MaineCare program that state lawmakers just bailed out.
Studies of potential Medicaid cuts from the University of North Carolina and Families USA found four Maine hospitals — Calais Community Hospital, Northern Light AR Gould Hospital in Presque Isle, Northern Light Maine Coast Hospital in Ellsworth and Cary Medical Center in Caribou — are among more than 300 rural hospitals at risk of closing.
Collins has left open the door to supporting those work requirements while opposing more direct cuts to the low-income health insurance program that serves nearly 400,000 Mainers. The Maine senator told Semafor she wants a $100 billion stabilization fund for rural hospitals in the final megabill, but Republican colleagues are discussing only $15 billion. Her office declined an interview request Wednesday, with a spokesperson referring a reporter to the Semafor story.
Maine Hospital Association lobbyist Jeff Austin said Thursday that “every iteration of the package we’ve seen would lead to significant financial challenges for hospitals.”
“There are so many moving parts that it’s difficult to know what is in or out right now,” Austin said. “But, if there is going to be some pain, anything that can mitigate that pain is appreciated.”
The parliamentarian was still reviewing other parts of the Senate bill, which includes an effort to defund Planned Parenthood, but she also ruled early Thursday against blocking plans that cover abortion from receiving certain Affordable Care Act payments.
There are more tax changes, from clean energy to children.
The Senate version of Trump’s megabill will also phase out — though more slowly than what House Republicans proposed — clean energy tax credits that have benefited Maine and rural areas in more conservative states.
Clean energy advocates have urged Collins to oppose the cuts by noting the credits have spurred more than $2 billion in investments in Maine and created hundreds of jobs. The Sierra Club said it was delivering around 1,000 signed postcards from Mainers to the senator’s Bangor office Friday that ask her to save the tax credits and oppose a public lands selloff.
One of the biggest sticking points among Republicans is raising the state and local tax deduction, or SALT, cap from $10,000 to $40,000 for those earning up to $500,000. Mills said she supports such an increase, saying it would provide “substantial relief to Maine taxpayers.”
The Congressional Budget Office and other studies have found high-income earners will benefit the most from the various proposed tax changes, but Trump and his allies have pointed to a boost in the $500 child tax credit to $2,500 through 2028 and adding $4,000 to the standard deduction for taxpayers 65 years and older.
No taxes on tips
The megabill continues to meet Trump’s “no taxes on tips” campaign promise for a broad array of service workers by allowing a deduction for total tipped income, with guardrails to prevent “highly compensated employees” from claiming earnings as tips.
Restaurant industry members and both conservative and liberal interest groups in Maine have previously warned of messy consequences. Cash tips are rarely reported as income in practice, and Dan Beck, general manager of Moody’s Diner in Waldoboro, said last year the plan is a “bad idea” that rewards servers who make more than cooks and prep people.
Yet the idea has been popular. Former Vice President Kamala Harris followed Trump in supporting it during their 2024 campaign, and it was supported by 55 percent of Mainers in the UNH poll. That has kept the president talking about the idea for a long time.