WASHINGTON — The Republican-controlled House voted 216-213 to give final passage to a bill cutting $9 billion in spending that had already been approved, sending it to President Donald Trump to become law.
The cuts aimed at public media and foreign aid passed in another middle-of-the-night vote on Capitol Hill, one day after the Senate voted 51-48 after 2 a.m. Thursday to approve the measure. Two Republicans joined all Democrats in opposing the package in the House: Reps. Mike Turner of Ohio and Brian Fitzpatrick of Pennsylvania.
The measure cuts $1.1 billion from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, which provides funding for NPR and PBS. It cuts $8 billion more from foreign aid, including to the U.S. Agency for International Development and programs to promote global health and refugee assistance. But planned cuts to PEPFAR were removed from the package in recent days, leaving funding for the popular Bush-era foreign aid program to combat HIV/AIDS intact.
The package, which was requested by the White House, passed both chambers with only Republican votes through a rarely used “rescissions” process that can bypass the 60-vote threshold in the Senate. GOP leaders touted it as a bid to slash “woke and wasteful” spending by the government.
“This bill tonight is part of continuing that trend of getting spending under control. Does it answer all the problems? No. Nine billion dollars, I would say, is a good start, and hopefully we do more things like this,” said House Majority Leader Steve Scalise, R-La.
Democrats unified to oppose the package, slamming the cuts as cruel, detrimental to American leadership and a cynical attempt by the GOP to appear fiscally responsible after it added $3.3 trillion to the debt in its party-line megabill that passed Congress this month.
Patricia Harrison, president and CEO of the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, said in a statement that the bill would have "profound, lasting, negative consequences for every American."
"For nearly six decades, public media has served families in every corner of America, especially rural and tribal communities, providing extraordinary vital content and services free of charge," she said.
The cuts would lead to many local public radio and television stations shutting shut down, meaning "millions of Americans will have less trustworthy information about their communities, states, country, and world," she added.
NPR in a statement after the vote condemned it as "an unwarranted dismantling of beloved local civic institutions, and an act of Congress that disregards the public will." Katherine Maher, president and CEO of NPR, said rural communities will feel the brunt of the negative impacts.
"Public radio is also a lifeline, connecting rural communities to the rest of the nation, and providing life-saving emergency broadcasting and weather alerts," Maher said. "Nearly 3-in-4 Americans say they rely on their public radio stations for alerts and news for their public safety."
The House voted after Republican leaders quelled a rebellion from their members on the Rules Committee who wanted a vote on requiring the government to release files relating to convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, an issue that has divided the MAGA wing of the party in recent days. They placated those GOP lawmakers by approving a separate “rule,” setting up a vote as soon as next week on a symbolic resolution calling for the release of certain Epstein documents.
Rep. Thomas Massie, R-Ky., who has proposed a separate Epstein-related measure that would carry the force of law, called the move by his party’s leaders a stunt.
“Congress thinks you’re stupid,” Massie said on X. “The rules committee passed a NON-BINDING Epstein resolution, hoping folks will accept it as real. It forces the release of NOTHING.”
Rep. Jamie Raskin, D-Md., said the Massie proposal, co-authored by Rep. Ro Khanna, D-Calif., has “teeth.” By contrast, he said, the version Republicans are advancing is “a meaningless, hortatory, fig leaf, Swiss cheese resolution that has no teeth at all.”
“It doesn’t even have dentures. It’s all cavities,” Raskin said. (Democrats, eager to fan the flames of Republican infighting, have embraced to push to release Epstein documents.)
Rep. Brandon Gill, R-Texas, called the domestic cuts an attempt to “defund left-wing state sponsored outlets.” Other Republicans — most notably Sen. Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, who voted against the measure — warned that the NPR and PBS cuts could be damaging to rural areas that rely on public broadcasting.
Rep. Teresa Leger Fernández, D-N.M., said, “The public will remember who stood with Big Bird and who strangled him.”
The bill had to return to the House after the Senate trimmed it from $9.4 billion, removing $400 million in proposed cuts to PEPFAR, which numerous Republicans said they support.
Before the vote, top Democrats in both chambers warned that the GOP was strangling the bipartisan nature of government funding by undoing previously approved spending on a partisan basis. They also said the rescissions package cedes too much power to the executive branch.
“I am deeply fearful that, at a time when appropriators must come together to defend our power of the purse, the path the majority has chosen will only survive to degrade the efficacy and credibility of what we are doing in this room,” Rep. Rosa DeLauro, D-Conn., the ranking member on the Appropriations Committee, said before the House vote.
