Is The Senate’s “A” DOA?, The Party of Illegal Immigrants & Vance’s Dance – July 2nd, 2025 - Driven By Braman Motorcars
Takeaway #1: The Senate version of the OBBBA Became Just “A” & May Be DOA
Barbecues, Booze, Fireworks (annoyingly until 2 in the morning), those will all be things that will be happening on Friday. What probably won’t be? President Trump putting pen to paper on the onetime One Big Potentially Aesthetically Pleasing Act. The Act that when passed by the Senate was renamed “the Act” in the end. That’s because in a maneuver so petty only Chuck Schumer would do it – just prior to the final senate vote Good ‘Ole Chuck U forced a motion to rename the One Big, Beautiful Bill Act, “the Act” by invoking a section of the “Byrd Rule”. One of the arcane “rules” of the senate named after the former Democrat KKK organizer turned longtime senator. Chuck U then literally went on to say that because of the formerly aesthetically pleasing act “people will get sick and die” and among other things like hungry kids. I think there’s a far better chance of people puking by listening to Chuck U. But anyway, here’s the thing and it’s a considerable thing. As a reminder, the House version of the bill only passed by exactly one vote. Just as was the case when VP JD Vance cast the tie-breaking vote yesterday.... And you need look no further than Texas Rep. Chip Roy, a reluctant ‘yea’ vote on the House bill to find another no vote. He spent much of the day yesterday saying stuff like this while being particularly critical of the latest incarnation of the “A:” I am tired of swamp creatures - including so-called conservatives ones - gaslighting America when it’s politically convenient for them to do so. We have the majority in the Senate, we should be acting like it. The truth is, there are multiple Senators happy to let the parliamentarian act as a foil to preserve the status quo. That’s not leadership, that’s service to the swamp. And in reference to the senate version also not ending the Biden Administration's (anything but) Inflation Reduction Act, that Roy calls the “Green New Scam” until 2027... This is a deal-killer of an already bad deal. That sounds pretty final. Now, perhaps President Trump, (who was in an actual swamp opening Alligator Alcatraz when the A passed the senate – more on than one in a minute) who more than anything, wants to be signing the Act on Friday, can work some magic with Chip and other disenchanted House GOPers, but I wouldn’t count on it. And that’s in part because Chip is absolutely right, on principle, not to want to support some of what’s in this bill. Independent of other factors can we all agree that it’s entirely unacceptable to continue to pay for illegal immigrants, including criminal illegal immigrants to get “free” healthcare under Medicaid? I can understand where Roy and some of the other conservative skeptics are coming from. If a Republican controlled senate won’t do whatever it takes to strip benefits from criminal illegal immigrants – what exactly does that say? That they’re only marginally better than...
Takeaway #2: The Party of Criminal Illegal Immigrants?
No, I’m not saying that Democrat senators are criminal illegal immigrants – although a case could be potentially made for Pocahontas. I am saying that they’ve proven to be the party of illegal immigrants both of the criminal and civil offense variety. That was evident during the four years of open border policies under the Biden administration, it’s clear based on their opposition to President Trump’s efforts to detain and deport criminal illegal immigrants...which by the way, we recently learned from ICE includes 435,719 illegal immigrants with known criminal convictions still roaming around the country with another 226,847 that have pending charges against them due to the Biden administration. But thanks to recent Supreme Court rulings and yesterday’s grand opening of Alligator Alcatraz, perhaps the next place they’ll be migrating to is the old Dade-Collier Training and Transition Airport which is now officially online and able to house 3,000 detainees, making it the largest detention and deportation facility in the country. Btw, yesterday, President Trump had an instant classic, when he was asked by a reporter about prisoners attempting to escape. He had this to say: Snakes are fast, but alligators...we’re going to teach them how to run away from an alligator, ok. If they escape prison. Don’t run in a straight line, run like this (waves hand in a zig zag pattern) and you know what? Your chances go up by about 1%. Oh, and btw, the facility is fully up to code including AC. How many reports have you heard in the GSS media that said something to the contrary recently? But perhaps it was as clear as it’s ever been based on actions taken by Democrats in the senate over the two-day vote-a-rama extravaganza. Where not once, but twice almost all Democrats and one theoretical Republican (Susan Collins) voted against ending Medicaid access for illegal and criminal illegal immigrants. Which means...
Takeaway #3: JD Vance missed the moment
Yes, he was the tie-breaking vote to pass the Senate’s A. No, as the president of the senate, he didn’t lead. The reason Medicaid for illegals, which is a non-starter for conservatives in the House, remained in the bill was because the Senate parliamentarian ruled that those benefits couldn’t be cut through the reconciliation process and instead needed 60 floor votes. Both senate votes subsequently failed 56-44. However, had JD Vance overruled the parliamentarian, which is his prerogative to do, and has been done three times previously by vice presidents, those benefits would have been stripped along with a lot of the waste, fraud, abuse and related government program shenanigans. Now at first, when I saw that Collins voted with Democrats against ending Medicaid and related benefits for criminal illegal immigrants, I wondered if Vance didn’t overrule the parliamentarian and force the vote because he needed the Collins vote to pass the bill in the end. But that proved to not be the case because she voted against it anyway (along with all Democrats and Rand Paul and Tom Tillis). So, whether it was a political miscalculation on his part, or because he became weak kneaded about what would be said about him for overruling the parliamentarian – JD Vance missed the moment to do the right thing – which is he had may have been enough to get the House onboard in time for Friday’s Independence Day festivities.