Today's Top Stories

 

Good morning. For the first time in over a decade, the Fourth of July is on a Friday. A record number of people are expected to travel. Before hitting the road, check out these travel tips for the long weekend. Here’s the news we’re following today:

Today's Top Stories (NPR)

After a nearly day-long stalemate, House Republicans were able to get through the procedural vote on President Trump’s massive tax and spending package. GOP holdouts delayed the vote for several hours overnight, but ultimately, enough members agreed to move the bill forward. Now, the bill is being debated on the House floor. Once that’s done, the House can proceed to a final vote. If House Republicans obtain the votes needed, they could make good on their promise to deliver the bill to the president’s desk by tomorrow.

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🎧 Moderates in the House were opposed to the Senate’s changes to the bill, which include steeper cuts to Medicaid. At the same time, fiscal hawks said the cuts aren’t deep enough. Some of the holdouts wanted material changes to the bill, but Republican leaders argued it was too late in the process for those adjustments. NPR’s Claudia Grisales tells Up First that it is possible that promises on future legislation were made to help sway holdouts. Democrats will likely make this bill a centerpiece of their push to win back Congress in the next year.  Several fiscal forecasters predict that the big tax cut and spending bill will likely increase the federal debt by trillions of dollars over the next decade. They expect the bill to have minimal impact on boosting the economy. The plan would extend tax cuts from the first Trump administration and introduce additional tax breaks, reducing government revenues. Additionally, the measure increases government spending on defense and immigration enforcement. 🎧 The plan isn’t the direction the government should be going in, and “every fiscal warning sign is blinking red right now,” Maya MacGuineas, who heads the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget, tells NPR's Scott Horsley. Most of the individual tax cuts will benefit the wealthiest taxpayers, while families earning less than $55,000 a year will, on average, be worse off. Horsley says this is because any tax savings that these families receive will be overshadowed by cuts to programs such as Medicaid and food stamps. Hip-hop mogul Sean Combs received a mixed verdict from the jury yesterday in his federal criminal trial in Manhattan. He was found not guilty of the more serious charges of racketeering and sex trafficking, but was found guilty on two lesser counts of transportation to engage in prostitution. If Combs had been found guilty of racketeering and sex trafficking, he could have faced life in prison. 🎧 NPR’s Anastasia Tsioulcas, who was in court for many days, says the whole trial has been a circus. The main courtroom and overflow rooms were packed with fans, tourists, families with small children and social media influencers. Yesterday, when the verdict was announced, Tsioulcas says she could hear gasps and cheers. Combs was also down on the ground, kneeling in gratitude. Combs will remain in custody until his sentencing hearing.