WASHINGTON—House Republicans appear stuck on July 2 when it comes to advancing President Donald Trump’s One Big Beautiful Bill Act.

As of Wednesday evening, a vote on Rep. Virginia Foxx’s (R-N.C.) amendment to the bill had been left open on the floor for over three and a half hours, which often happens when leadership is trying to whip up support for legislation behind the scenes.

This comes one day after the Senate passed its version of the bill in a vote that ended in a tie. Vice President JD Vance broke the tie by voting in favor.

Now, House Republicans are working overtime to bring their ideologically-divided caucus—split between moderates and conservatives who often want opposing outcomes—on board with the mammoth bill. With Republicans controlling 220 seats to Democrats’ 212, House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) can spare no more than three defections.

Earlier on Wednesday, both factions met at the White House to discuss the bill with Trump, who is encouraging its passage by July 4.

While that outcome seems far from guaranteed, House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Jason Smith (R-Mo.) told reporters he was feeling confident a deal could be reached.

“We have a real opportunity to deliver one of the most impactful pieces of legislation, and we’re gonna do it,” Smith said.

Here are some of the biggest unresolved divisions in the bill.

Pricetag

Many conservatives have expressed concerns about the bill’s impact on the national debt as well as the deficit.

“The changes the Senate made to the House passed Beautiful Bill, including unacceptable increases to the national debt and the deficit, are going to make passage in the House difficult,” Rep. Marlin Stutzman (R-Ind.) wrote on X.

The conservative Freedom Caucus said in an X post on June 30: “The Senate’s version adds $651 billion to the deficit—and that’s before interest costs, which nearly double the total. That’s not fiscal responsibility. It’s not what we agreed to.”

Rep. Ralph Norman (R-S.C.), a caucus member, told The Epoch Times on July 1 that he would vote against the legislation. Norman and other fiscal hawks have called for at least $2 trillion in spending cuts, while the bill delivers $1.5 trillion in cuts.

In a document circulated by the Freedom Caucus, first reported by Punchbowl News, it states that the Senate added $400 billion to the bill passed by the House.

There are also concerns about the Congressional Budget Office’s (CBO) prediction of a $3.2 trillion deficit increase under the bill.

Rep. Jeff Van Drew (R-N.J.) took a different perspective.

“People are going to have more money to spend, the economy is going to do well, and people are going to be happy,” Van Drew told reporters.

Johnson and Trump have argued that the bill will reduce the deficit by kindling economic growth, and have criticized the CBO numbers for relying on a lower growth rate.

Cut Provisions

Rep. Chip Roy (R-Texas), who also voted against advancing the bill through the House Rules Committee, posted on X that the Senate eliminated provisions passed in the House version of the legislation.

This included getting rid of “provisions to terminate the ‘green new scam’ subsidies in the House bill,” removing “key provisions we put in the bill to stop illegal aliens from getting Medicaid,” and eliminating “key provisions we put in the bill to stop taxpayer funding of transgender surgeries.”

The latter two were ruled by Senate Parliamentarian Elizabeth MacDonough as not germane to the Byrd Rule, which requires reconciliation bills to be related to government spending, revenue, and the national debt.

The Senate also removed a provision that required at least one parent of a child with a “Trump Account,” an account to accumulate savings for newborns, to be a U.S. citizen. The U.S. government would deposit $1,000 for every account.

The Freedom Caucus document alleges that the Senate watered down a House provision to cut waste, fraud, and abuse from the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), which issues food stamps, as “it fails to prevent blue states from gerrymandering counties and cities to get around the work requirements.”

Medicaid

While the Freedom Caucus sought deep Medicaid cuts, this is a concern for moderates such as Rep. Don Bacon (R-Neb.).

The Senate cut Medicaid by more than $1 trillion, while the House version cut it by $800 billion. Both figures are over the span of a decade.

In a June 24 letter to Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.), a group of moderates wrote that the “House’s approach reflects a more pragmatic and compassionate standard.”

They also wrote that they are “concerned about rushed implementation timelines, penalties for expansion states, changes to the community engagement requirements for adults with dependents, and cuts to emergency Medicaid funding” as “these changes would place additional burdens on hospitals already stretched thin by legal and moral obligations to provide care.”

Rep. Dusty Johnson (R-S.D.), a leader in the moderate Main Street Caucus, said he and many other moderates had, nevertheless, had their concerns assuaged by their meeting with Trump.

Asked about the meeting, Johnson said Trump “and particularly [Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services Administrator] Dr. [Mehmet] Oz did a good job of working through some of the specifics.”

“The president is the best closer in the business, and he got a lot of members to ‘Yes’ in that meeting,” he said.

Rep. John McGuire (R-Va.), a supporter of the bill, said that Republicans’ changes to the currently “unsustainable” program will ensure that it’s “available for people who need it for future generations.”

Rep. Greg Murphy (R-N.C.) told reporters: “We’re going after waste, fraud, and abuse. People shouldn’t be on the system who are not eligible.”

Other Issues

Additionally, an issue with the bill, according to the document, is that it does not phase out quick enough the green credits under the Inflation Reduction Act as it “guts the benefit by including a last-minute carveout for projects that ‘begin construction’ a year after enactment, which will create a race to do the minimum 5 percent construction spending to lock in subsidies well past 2027.”

Finally, an issue with the bill, according to the document, is that it includes $50 billion for rural hospitals—which they call a “slush fund”—and a “100 percent tax deduction for meal expenses on Alaskan fishing boats, and special lower thresholds for waivers for Alaska for SNAP work requirements and state cost share requirements, even after giving them a blanket waiver through 2028.”