• Two House Republicans voted against the "Big Beautiful Bill" on Thursday.
• Now, White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt says Trump wants them to face primary challenges.
• "I don't think he likes to see grandstanders in Congress," she said.

Four months into his second term, President Donald Trump wants members of his own party thrown out of office over their perceived lack of loyalty to his "Big Beautiful Bill"

That was the message delivered by White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt after two Republicans — Reps. Warren Davidson of Ohio and Thomas Massie of Kentucky — voted against Trump's bill as it passed the House on Thursday.

Asked by a reporter at a briefing later on Thursday whether Trump think the duo should be primaried, Leavitt responded: "I believe he does."

"I don't think he likes to see grandstanders in Congress," Leavitt said. "'What's the alternative?' I would ask those members of Congress. Did they want to see a tax hike? Did they want to see our country go bankrupt?"

Both Massie and Davidson are deficit hawks who voted against the bill because, in their view, it did not cut spending enough.

Other Republicans have raised concerns about the bill's effect on the deficit but voted for it anyway. Rep. Andy Harris of Maryland, the chairman of the hardline House Freedom Caucus, voted "present."

In response to Leavitt's comments, Massie asked for donations on X.

"For voting on principle, I now have the President AND his press Secretary campaigning against me from the White House podium," Massie wrote. "Can you help me by donating?"

A spokesperson for Davidson did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

While the Ohio congressman doesn't typically cross Trump, the president has long been critical of Massie — and vice versa. The Kentucky Republican backed Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis during the 2024 GOP primary, and Trump previously called for Massie to face a primary challenge in 2020.

Earlier this week, Trump bashed Massie in front of reporters.

"I don't think Thomas Massie understands government. I think he's a grandstander," Trump said on Tuesday. "I think he should be voted out of office."

• The GOP renamed "MAGA accounts" to "Trump accounts."
• If approved, $1,000 will go to any baby born between 2024 and 2028.
• Sen. Ted Cruz — the person who came up with the idea — says he doesn't mind the Trumpified name.

First, they were called "MAGA accounts." Now, they're "Trump accounts."

As part of their "One Big Beautiful Bill," Republicans on Capitol Hill want to establish new investment accounts for American children. Under the plan, babies born after January 31, 2024 and before January 1, 2029 — essentially, the last three years of President Donald Trump's term — will receive $1,000 for the account from the federal government.

The original name was an acronym for "Money Account for Growth and Advancement" — the same initials as Trump's political movement. In a last-minute change before the House passed their version of the "Big Beautiful Bill" on Thursday, "MAGA" was replaced with "Trump."

While the president stands to get the credit, it was Sen. Ted Cruz's idea to create "Invest America" accounts. The Texas Republican says he doesn't mind.

"What I care is that they remain in there," Cruz told BI, referring to the provision's inclusion in the larger bill. "I think it doesn't matter what they're called. What it matters is what they do."

In terms of political branding, it's further than other recent presidents have gone. President Joe Biden, for instance, chose not to sign COVID-19 stimulus checks like Trump did — though he later said it was "stupid" not to do so.

Other government-backed programs have taken on the name of their creators. The Affordable Care Act, championed by President Barack Obama, is commonly known as "Obamacare," though that was initially a Republican epithet. And Sens. William Roth and Claiborne Pell have also found their names written into the tax code.

"That is not unusual," Cruz said. "You have things like Roth IRAs that were named after Senator Roth. You have things like Pell Grants that were named after Senator Pell. You have things like Obamacare that were named after President Obama."

It's unclear exactly why the accounts were named after Trump, and the White House did not respond to a request for comment.

Cruz had pitched the idea as a way to give kids a stake in the free market from an early age, allowing them to potentially reap financial benefits down the line while making them less likely to support socialism.

"It enables every newborn child in America to experience the enormous benefits of compounded growth, and to accumulate significant resources with the passage of time," Cruz said. "It creates a generation of new capitalists."

According to the bill, individuals with "Trump accounts" will be able to use the savings for things like higher education and first-time home purchases starting at age 18.

Money taken out of the account for those purposes will be taxed as long-term capital gains, while money withdrawn for other purposes is taxed as regular income.

• A "No Tax on Tips" bill passed the Senate on Tuesday with no Democratic opposition.
• This was one of Trump's key economic campaign promises.
• But several Democrats told BI that they still had questions about the proposal.

A bipartisan bill to exempt tips from federal income tax passed the Senate. That doesn't mean everyone's fully behind the idea, which was one of President Donald Trump's key campaign promises.

In fact, lawmakers on both sides of the aisle are surprised that the "No Tax on Tips Act," a bipartisan bill sponsored by Republican Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas and Democratic Sen. Jacky Rosen of Nevada, passed at all.

"I'm a little amazed the Democrats didn't block it," Cruz told BI. "But I'll take yes for an answer."

As it turns out, Cruz's surprise is warranted. While no Democratic senators said they were outright opposed, several told BI on Wednesday that they still had questions or concerns about the idea, or were simply ambivalent about it.

"That's one way to approach the topic," Democratic Sen. Tim Kaine of Virginia. "The other way is to raise the minimum wage, and sort of eliminate a tip-based economy, which is what a lot of countries do."

"It's obviously great for people who make their incomes off of tips. It's just a question of fairness," Democratic Sen. Chris Murphy of Connecticut said. "It just, on its own, seems to be a little strange to decide that certain workers are getting taxed at a rate that's much less than other workers."

The bill passed on Tuesday night after Rosen made a "unanimous consent request," a procedure that senators can use either to pass non-controversial legislation or highlight the other party's opposition to one of their bills. If no senator shows up to object, it passes.

Senators are notified about these requests ahead of time, giving them plenty of time to prepare to object. But no one in either party did so, despite some expectation that Republicans would, given that their own version of the proposal is included in the "One Big Beautiful Bill" reconciliation package.

"Frankly, I was surprised," Murphy said, adding that he assumed a member of the Senate Finance Committee would "object to something that big going outside of regular order."

'I haven't studied the full implications'

The No Tax on Tips Act would allow tipped workers to claim a tax deduction of up to $25,000 for the sum of all tips they earned in the previous year. The GOP's "Big Beautiful Bill" includes a similar provision, but without the $25,000 cap.

For Rosen, passing the bill was smart politics. Her home state of Nevada has among the highest concentrations of tipped workers in the country, owing to the hospitality and entertainment industry in cities like Las Vegas.

The senator also wanted to divorce the issue from the GOP's broader bill, which includes safety-net cuts that Democrats oppose.

"Our office ran a hotline on both sides of the aisle and, after seeing no objections, Senator Rosen went to the floor to pass this bipartisan bill by itself and without any poison pills," a spokesperson for Rosen told BI. "In doing so, Senate Democrats are showing we can deliver tax relief for working-class families without Republicans' extreme cuts to Medicaid and SNAP."

Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer applauded the passage of the bill on Tuesday, saying in a statement that "thanks to Senator Rosen's incredible leadership, we are one step closer to eliminating taxes on tipped wages for hardworking Americans."

But while the bill has the support of Republicans and Nevada's other Democratic senator, Catherine Cortez Masto, none of the Democratic senators who BI spoke with on Wednesday said they were fully supportive of the idea.

"I haven't studied the full implications," said Sen. Bernie Sanders, an independent who caucuses with Democrats. "I fear very much that corporations may be able to use it in certain ways."

"It's not the worst element of this bill, though," Sanders added.

"No tax on tips makes a great headline, but if it's not done the right way, it fails to help hardworking people who are barely scraping by, while it gives one more boost to Wall Streeters who change their compensation to tipped income," Sen. Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts said. "So, like so many things, the devil is in the details."

Rosen's bill does include a provision to prevent the wealthy from doing what Warren suggests, barring those who earn more than $160,000 a year from claiming the deduction.

Sen. Ron Wyden of Oregon, the top Democrat on the Senate Finance Committee and a key voice within the party on tax policy, declined to comment specifically on the no tax on tips proposal, only saying that Democrats as a whole want to find ways to help workers.

"I strongly favor getting relief to the workers," Wyden said. "But we know we have a lot of legislative hoops to jump through."

• Eight sitting members of Congress have died since November 2022.
• Every single one of them was a Democrat.
• The party has been wrestling with age and gerontocracy for years.

In the last two and a half years, eight sitting members of the House or Senate have died in office. Every time, it's been a Democrat.

Rep. Gerry Connolly of Virginia, the top Democrat on the House Oversight Committee, died on Wednesday at 75, after a battle with esophageal cancer.

He's the third House Democrat to die in the last three months. If Democrats had gained a narrow 1 or 2-seat majority in 2024, they would have lost it by now.

The streak of Democratic deaths could just be something of a coincidence. After all, there are plenty of elderly and diminished Republican lawmakers on Capitol Hill, including former Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell.

But Democrats do tend to be older than Republicans, on average. A report from FiscalNote found that in the last Congress, the average House Democrat was six years older than the average House Republican, while the gap was seven years in he upper chamber.

There are some potential structural reasons for this as well, including the seniority system, which Democrats tend to employ more than Republicans.

The deaths are just another data point in a long-running conversation that's been raging within the Democratic Party for years about age and gerontocracy, which culminated last year in President Joe Biden's decision to drop out of the presidential race after a disastrous debate performance.

Since then, Democrats in particular have been taking age more seriously, including when it comes to who's serving in important committee positions. Connolly notably beat back a challenge from Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York in December for the Oversight position he's now vacated.

Here's the full list of Democratic lawmakers who have died in office since November 2022:

• Rep. Gerry Connolly of Virginia
• Rep. Raúl Grijalva of Arizona
• Rep. Sylvester Turner of Texas
• Rep. Bill Pascrell of New Jersey
• Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee of Texas
• Rep. Donald Payne of New Jersey
• Sen. Dianne Feinstein of California
• Rep. Donald McEachin of Virginia

• Elon Musk says he's pulling back from political spending.
• That's a big reversal from what he said he'd do months ago.
• Now, the GOP is going to have to make up the gap somehow.

Elon Musk once seemed primed to be an unlimited piggy bank for President Donald Trump and the GOP, keeping the party afloat while quashing internal dissent with the threat of an avalanche of money.

Now, that's all been thrown into doubt.

The world's richest man — by far the biggest political donor in America in 2024 — said on Tuesday that he'll be spending "a lot less" on elections in the future. "I think I've done enough," he told an interviewer. "If I see a reason to do political spending in the future, I will do it. I do not currently see a reason."

It's something of a reversal for the DOGE leader, who once said that his super PAC, America PAC, would "play a significant role in primaries." He'd even pledged to go after Democrats and get involved in local district attorney races.

Both his supporters and critics within the GOP expected him to throw around his weight. Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia said that any senator who voted against Trump's nominees would "have to deal with Elon Musk and his great new PAC," while Sen. Lisa Murkowski of Alaska mused about Musk spending "the next billion dollars that he makes off of Starlink" against her.

It's unclear now exactly how much his political spending will decrease, and a spokesman for America PAC declined to comment. Musk could also change his mind or choose to route his fortune through "dark money" non-profit groups that don't have to disclose their donors.

"He's just trying to hide in the shadows," said Democratic Rep. Mark Pocan of Wisconsin, saying that Republicans "realize he's a liability, and they just want to put him in the back closet."

Musk spent nearly $300 million in 2024, and it wasn't just on Trump. He also spent more than $19 million on House races and gave more than $12 million to GOP super PACs that spent in Senate elections.

A diminished Musk is by no means the death knell for the GOP. The tech titan only started spending big on elections last year, and there are other sources of money for Republican campaigns. Republicans who spoke with BI generally dismissed concerns that Musk's step-back would have an impact.

"I don't think it's a major factor," Republican Sen. Kevin Cramer of North Dakota told BI. "I mean, to be honest, large-donor donations aren't really the recipe for success anyway these days. It's more small ones."

"I gotta be candid with you, I really don't care," said Republican Rep. Don Bacon of Nebraska, who benefitted from more than $864,000 in spending by Musk's PAC last year.

But it's still a massive financial gap that the party would have to make up somehow.

For now, Republicans' House and Senate campaign arms are remaining mum on what it all means: A spokesperson for the National Republican Campaign Committee declined to comment, while the National Republican Senatorial Committee did not respond to a request for comment.

On both sides of the aisle, lawmakers said that Musk's move is likely a response to the intense blowback that he and his businesses have endured over DOGE, with Democrats managing to turn the tech titan into a boogeyman.

"I get it," Republican Rep. Tim Burchett of Tennessee said of Musk's pull-back. "He suffered the consequences. The left came at him pretty hard."

Democrats have felt especially vindicated after a Wisconsin Supreme Court election in April, where Musk spent millions of dollars backing a Republican candidate who ultimately lost by ten points.

"This proves that that an anti-billionaire, pro-worker strategy works," Democratic Rep. Greg Casar of Texas told BI. "Republicans have thought that people having infinite money to spend for them is an asset. Democrats can make Musk's, and other oligarchs' money, toxic in elections if we're willing to make the case to the American people."

• Melania Trump made a rare public appearance at the White House on Monday.
• Trump praised her for bringing together both sides on revenge porn and deepfakes.
• The reality, however, is more complicated.

Melania Trump has never been a traditional first lady. But to hear it from President Donald Trump at a White House event on Monday, she also has a rare ability to smash past entrenched partisan divides.

"I'm not even sure you realize, honey," Trump said to his wife in the Rose Garden at the White House. "You know, a lot of the Democrats and Republicans don't get along so well. You've made them get along."

The first lady's purported achievement: Supporting the passage of the "TAKE IT DOWN" Act, a bill to combat revenge porn, including deepfakes generated by artificial intelligence.

Trump signed that bill on Monday. Though most states already have revenge porn laws on the books, it's the first bill that Trump has signed in his second term that touches AI.

Melania Trump's appearance on Monday was a relative rarity. The New York Times reported earlier this month that she had spent less than 14 days at the White House since Trump's second inauguration, and the first lady has long taken a different approach to the role from prior presidential spouses.

She ultimately spoke for less than four minutes, thanking lawmakers and advocates as she decried the impact of new technologies on children.

"Artificial intelligence and social media are the digital candy for the next generation: sweet, addictive, and engineered to have an impact on the cognitive development of our children," she said.

The first lady has sought to put her stamp on the legislation, framing it as a continuation of the children's well-being and online safety initiatives that she undertook during her husband's first term. "Today, I'm proud to say that the values of 'Be Best' will be reflected in the law," she said.

The reality, however, is more complex.

The bill had been making its way through Congress last year, and it was originally supposed to be signed into law before the Trumps returned to the White House.

But after the bill passed the Senate for the first time in December, the legislation was slipped into an ill-fated government funding bill that Elon Musk and hardline conservatives tanked for unrelated reasons.

The spending bill that ultimately passed days later did not include the TAKE IT DOWN Act, requiring lawmakers to go through the whole exercise once again this year.

The bill was also never that controversial, at least on Capitol Hill. While some digital rights advocates raised free speech concerns, only two lawmakers voted against it when it came up for a vote in the House last month.

Meanwhile, it passed the Senate via a "voice vote" — meaning no one opposed it, so there was no need to hold a vote — in both December and February.

On Monday, none of that was mentioned. The first lady, according to Trump, had taken up an "amazing issue," tackling a problem that's "gone on at levels that nobody's ever seen before."

"Working with our first lady, though, we've shown that that bipartisanship is possible," Trump said. "I mean, it's the first time I've seen such a level of bipartisanship, and it's a beautiful thing to do."

• Senators have filed financial disclosures for 2024, revealing details about how they make money.
• Some of them continue to rake in significant amounts of income from book sales.
• Others have part-time jobs, like Sen. Raphael Warnock of Georgia.

Being a senator can be a demanding job. But many of them still find the time do things on the side that help earn them an extra buck.

From book sales to part-time jobs, it's all laid out in the financial disclosures that members of Congress are required to file every year. Roughly half of senators filed those documents by the May 15 deadline, while the rest have requested an extension until August.

Democratic Sen. John Fetterman of Pennsylvania nearly doubled his income in 2024, bringing in a $172,500 advance payment from Penguin Random House for a forthcoming book. According to Semafor, the book is called "Unfettered" and will be co-written with Buzz Bissinger, the author of Friday Night Lights.

Fetterman's not the only one with a forthcoming book. Republican Sen. Tim Scott of South Carolina is set to release his fifth book, entitled "One Nation Always Under God," in August, according to his disclosure. A description from HarperCollins says the book is about "how Christian values forged our legal system, educational institutions, healthcare, social services, and more." Scott received $85,000 from the publisher in 2024.

Democratic Sen. Raphael Warnock of Georgia, meanwhile, has a second job on the side: He's still serving as a senior pastor at Ebenezer Baptist Church in Atlanta, drawing a $31,800 salary in 2024.

That second job has kept him busy. He took 15 different paid trips, including to London and the US Virgin Islands, as part of his role as a pastor in 2024. He also delivered eight paid speeches in connection with that, donating the combined $15,000 in compensation to charity.

He made over $150,700 in book royalties, which comes on top of a combined $1.1 million from books in 2023 and 2022.

Spokespeople for Fetterman, Scott, and Warnock did not respond to requests for comment.

All of this is ethically permissible. Lawmakers were permitted to make up to $32,000 in outside income in 2024, and there's no limit on how much they can earn from book sales.

Many of the US Senate's most prominent members have taken advantage of that, raking in hundreds of thousands of dollars year after year.

Among them are Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont, who made $148,750 in book royalties in 2024, and Sen. Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts, who has historically made lots of money from books but brought in just $27,900 last year.

In 2023, eight senators made more than $100,000 from books, while six of them made more than their annual salary of $174,000 in 2022.

Second jobs are less common, but Warnock's not the only one.

Last year, former Sen. Kyrsten Sinema made about $29,900 from teaching at Arizona State University, while now-Secretary of State Marco Rubio made about $20,800 as an adjunct professor at Florida International University.

• One of Trump's Cabinet secretaries made an especially well-timed trade of Trump Media stock.
• Attorney General Pam Bondi sold off her millions of dollars in shares on April 2.
• That's the same day Trump announced new tariffs, sending the market reeling.

A key member of President Donald Trump's administration made an especially well-timed stock trade last month, according to a disclosure made public this week.

Attorney General Pam Bondi sold off her shares of Trump Media Stock on April 2 — the same day as Trump's "Liberation Day" tariff announcement, which sent stock prices plunging in the days afterward.

The exact value of Bondi's shares at the time is unknown, but they were worth more than $3.9 million in December, according to documents obtained by Business Insider at the time.

The attorney general was required to divest from her shares in the company, which she earned through consulting work, within 90 days of her confirmation. Bondi most likely didn't profit significantly from the divestiture. Trump Media closed at $18.76 on April 2, while the stock was consistently trading for more than $30 per share in December.

But it was still well-timed — the stock price fell about 13% over the course of the following days, though it eventually bounced back after Trump announced a 90-day pause on "reciprocal" tariffs on April 9.

It's unclear whether Bondi had advance knowledge of Trump's tariff moves. The Justice Department didn't immediately respond to a request for comment.

Democrats have repeatedly suggested that Trump engaged in market manipulation with his tariff moves and that his allies may have known about it ahead of time.

No hard evidence of this has emerged, though Republican Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia made a series of well-timed trades during the April dip.

Bondi's trades have already attracted Democratic scrutiny as well.

"We need an investigation into whether Attorney General Bondi engaged in insider trading," Democratic Rep. Greg Casar of Texas wrote on X on Thursday. "A culture of corruption has infected the Republican Party. Americans deserve answers."

• House Republicans narrowly passed Trump's "One Big Beautiful Bill" on May 22.
• It includes new tax cuts, changes to Medicaid, saving accounts for kids, and other provisions.
• Here's what you should know about the centerpiece of Trump's legislative agenda.

For months, President Donald Trump has pursued his sweeping agenda through executive actions. Now, he's experiencing the hard part.

Republicans put pen to paper on what Trump has called his "One Big Beautiful Bill. On May 22, House Republicans narrowly passed the sweeping fiscal package that serves as the centerpiece of the president's legislative agenda on a 215-214 vote.

The bill includes GOP priorities like no taxes on tips or overtime, cuts to Medicaid, "Trump accounts" for children and several other provisions.

The process is far from over, even after House Republicans spent weeks debating its details, culminating in a 22-hour committee hearing.

Senate Republicans are likely to further change the legislation, meaning the House would need to vote again. Republicans hope to send the bill to Trump's desk by July 4.

Here's what you should know about what's in the "One Big Beautiful Bill."

The bill includes cuts to Medicaid, and millions could lose health coverage

As part of the House-approved bill, states would implement work requirements by the end of 2026 for childless adults on Medicaid who do not have a disability, mandating they work for 80 hours a month.

A previous version of the bill gave states until 2029 to implement the strict requirements, but House conservatives successfully pushed for the changes to come sooner.

One component of the plan would increase the price of doctors' visits, mandating beneficiaries making above the federal poverty limit to pay co-payments of up to $35. States would also be required to stop taxing hospitals and nursing homes in order to secure more federal funding.

Medicaid recipients in some states would have more paperwork to regularly confirm their residency status and income. And the plan would lower federal funding for some recipients in states that fund medical coverage for undocumented immigrants.

Conservatives also secured another victory by inserting a provision that would incentivize states to not expand Medicaid to a broader group of low-income adults under the Affordable Care Act, Politico reported.

The Congress Budget Office previously estimated that an earlier version of the legislation would save about $912 billion over the next decade in federal spending, about $715 billion of which would derive from Medicaid and Affordable Care Act cuts. The CBO said about 8.6 million people could lose their insurance coverage.

The plan came short of expectations among some ultraconservatives who wanted more Medicaid cuts at the federal level. Some GOP leaders wanted per-capita caps for those in Medicaid expansion states and a lower across-the-board rate at which the federal government supplements each state's funding for Medicaid programs.

Democrats have strongly opposed the bill, emphasizing that millions of Americans will potentially have their lives uprooted by Medicaid cuts.

No tax on tips or overtime, making Trump's 2017 tax cuts permanent, and more

Some of Trump's flashiest campaign promises were to remove taxes on tips, overtime, and Social Security. This bill largely gets those done, but only for the next four years — lawmakers will have to decide whether to renew the cuts in 2029.

The bill would allow workers in an "occupation that traditionally and customarily receives tips" to claim a tax deduction for the sum of all tips that they received in the previous year. It would also do the same for overtime wages. Neither deduction is available to anyone who is a "highly compensated employee."

To help accomplish Trump's "no taxes on Social Security" pledge, Republicans created a new $4,000 tax deduction for seniors making less than $75,000 per year. There's also a provision in the bill to fulfill Trump's promise of no taxes on car loan interest.

There's also an extension of the child tax credit, which is currently $2,000 but was set to decrease to $1,000 after this year. The bill would increase the credit to $2,500 through 2028, then it would drop to $2,000 permanently after that.

If you're thinking of buying an electric vehicle, you might want to do so before the end of the year. The bill would eliminate existing tax credits for new and used EVs, and it would impose an annual registration fee of $250 for EV owners.

The bill also makes permanent a slew of tax cuts that Trump and Republicans enacted in 2017. The average American won't feel much of a difference, since they've probably gotten used to the existing tax rates and brackets that have existed since 2018. But it's the most consequential part of the bill from a budgetary perspective, adding trillions to the deficit over the next several years.

Trump savings accounts

The bill establishes Trump savings accounts for children. The idea was originally proposed by Republican Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas. In an initial draft of the bill, Republicans called the accounts "Money account for growth and advancement" accounts, or MAGA accounts.

At the last minute, House Republicans renamed the accounts after the president.

The federal government would pay $1,000 to babies born from 2024 through 2028. After the cutoff, parents will still be able to put $5,000 per year into each account.

Cruz's proposal is similar to previous Democratic-led efforts for "baby bonds," but the biggest difference is that there is no income cutoff. Sen. Cory Booker of New Jersey, a Democrat, envisioned a program primarily targeted at low-income families.

A repeal of Biden's student loan forgiveness plans

If enacted, the reconciliation bill would mean major changes for student-loan borrowers. The legislation proposes terminating all existing income-driven student-loan repayment plans, including Biden's SAVE income-driven repayment plan, which would have shortened the timeline for debt relief and provided cheaper monthly payments. While SAVE is currently paused due to litigation, Trump and Republican lawmakers have said they would not carry out the plan if it survives in court.

Under the bill, borrowers would have two repayment plan options: one, called the Repayment Assistance Plan, would allow for loan forgiveness after 360 qualifying payments, and the other option would be a standard repayment plan with a fixed monthly payment over a fixed time period set by the servicer.

Payments made under the Repayment Assistance Plan would be calculated based on the borrower's income and would count toward Public Service Loan Forgiveness.

A 10-year ban on state-level AI laws

House lawmakers handed a major win to Big Techby including a 10-year federal preemption on all state artificial intelligence laws in the larger bill. Congress has talked about a federal AI policy, but no serious legislative proposals have emerged.

In the meantime, states have tried to fill to void. Major tech companies have long fought state-level AI regulations. Last year, California lawmakers passed the nation's most sweeping AI legislation only for Gov. Gavin Newsom to veto it.

Meta, OpenAI, and Anthropic lobbied against California's bill. Meta recently wrote to the White House that state laws "could impede innovation and investment."

The issue isn't going away. In the 2024 legislative session, lawmakers in at least 45 states introduced AI-related bills, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures.

Unlike most of the other provisions on this list, the AI regulation ban faces major hurdles to making it into law. Republicans must adhere to strict parliamentary rules to pass Trump's bill without facing a Democratic filibuster in the Senate. One rule is that all provisions must be primarily fiscal in nature, and many expect that the AI provision will fail that test.

A debt ceiling hike, the end of IRS Direct file, money for a border wall, and more

Avoiding default: Republicans would raise the debt limit by $4 trillion, staving off a potential default that could come later this summer. One way or another, Congress will have to address the debt issue soon. The federal government is expected to exhaust its borrowing ability sometime in August.

Billions for missile defense: Trump wants the US to have a futuristic missile defense system inspired by Israel's vaunted "Iron Dome" air defenses, but the US shield would include space-based components and focus on longer-range missile threats rather than the smaller weapons Israel faces. House Republicans have allocated roughly $25 billion for overall missile defense, most of which will go to the "Golden Dome" project.

700 more miles of Trump's border wall: Republicans proposed spending roughly $47 billion on border barriers, which will cover 701 miles of "primary wall," 900 miles of river barriers, and 629 miles of secondary barriers. Trump repeatedly fought in his first term to build a massive border wall between the US and Mexico but struggled to get funding through Congress.

A big tax increase on large university endowments: Republicans would significantly increase Trump's 2017 groundbreaking tax on colleges and universities with large endowments. Under the bill, the tax rate would be tied to the size of their endowment, adjusted by student enrollment. At the low end, the rate would remain at 1.4%. At the highest level, universities would pay 21% tax if they have an endowment of $2 million or more per student.

IRS direct file: The big beautiful bill would officially kill off the IRS's Direct File program, a Biden-era initiative that has long been a subject of Republican ire. In April, a Treasury Department official told BI that it was a failed and disappointing program. The new legislation would instead allocate funding towards studying a public-private partnership to provide free filing for a majority of taxpayers.

• Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene was called out by a fellow Republican for recent stock trades.
• He said those trades were "just another reason why" lawmakers should be banned from trading stocks.
• Greene has attracted scrutiny for well-timed trades made around Trump's tariff moves.

First, it was Democrats who made a big deal out of Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene's stock trading habits. Now, a fellow Republican is joining in.

"Just another reason why stock trading by members of Congress or their spouses should be banned," Rep. Mike Lawler of New York wrote on X in response to a post showing that one of the Georgia congresswoman's recent stock purchases had paid off.

Lawler, who does not own any individual stocks, is a co-sponsor of the TRUST in Congress Act, a bill to require lawmakers and their spouses to divest from stocks or place them in a blind trust.

Greene has attracted scrutiny in recent weeks for a series of well-timed trades she made around President Donald Trump's tariff moves in early April.

When stock prices began to fall after the April 2 "Liberation Day" announcement, Greene began investing tens of thousands of dollars into a variety of stocks, continuing to do so right up until stock prices shot back up after Trump announced that most of those tariffs would be paused for 90 days.

The congresswoman has said that her stock portfolio is managed by an outside financial advisor.

"All of my investments are reported with full transparency. I refuse to hide my stock trades in a blind trust like many others do," the congressman said in a statement previously shared with BI. "Since my portfolio manager makes my trades for me, I usually find out about them when the media asks."

She's not the only lawmaker who bought the dip: Democratic Rep. Jared Moskowitz of Florida did as well.

But Democrats have suggested that Greene, a close Trump ally, may have been aware of Trump's tariff moves ahead of time. The congresswoman has denied that.

Lawler's post came on the heels of a feud between the two lawmakers that began on Wednesday, when Greene denounced the New York congressman for opposing Republicans' "Big Beautiful Bill" over a tax provision.

• House Speaker Mike Johnson said on Wednesday that he supports a ban on stock trading in Congress.
• But he said he has "sympathy" for arguments against it.
• Trump recently said he supported a stock trading ban and would sign it into law.

House Speaker Mike Johnson says he supports banning members of Congress from trading stocks — but has "sympathy" for arguments against it.

"I'm in favor of that, because I don't think we should have any appearance of impropriety," Johnson told reporters on Wednesday, before adding that there's an "other side" to the argument.

The speaker, whose own personal finances are relatively modest, noted that annual salaries for rank-and-file members of Congress have remained frozen at $174,000 since 2009 and that some lawmakers may find it hard to make the job work financially.

"If you stay on this trajectory, you're going to have less qualified people who are willing to make the extreme sacrifice to run for Congress," Johnson said. "So the counterargument is — and I have some sympathy — look, at least let them, like, engage in some stock trading, so that they can continue to, you know, take care of their family."

The speaker previously told NPR that he was "open to the conversation" about a stock trading ban, but declined at the time to take a position.

Johnson doesn't own or trade any stocks himself, according to his 2023 financial disclosure. The Louisiana congressman is far less wealthy than most members of Congress and once slept in his Capitol Hill office.

The speaker on Wednesday went on to say that blatant insider trading would not be tolerated.

"Look, we have no tolerance for anything even resembling insider trading, or any of this kind of advantage that anybody can take, zero tolerance for it," Johnson said. "And we'll stamp it out ourselves."

Stock trading by members of Congress has been controversial for years, and lawmakers have made multiple attempts to ban the practice.

The idea gained more momentum in recent weeks after President Donald Trump said he would sign a stock trading ban into law.

Democrats have also called attention to well-timed stock trades made by Republican Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia during a dip in the stock market caused by Trump's April 2 tariff announcement.

She's not the only person who benefited. Democratic Rep. Jared Moskowitz of Florida also plunged tens of thousands of dollars into stocks during that same period, just days before Trump's announcement of a 90-day "reciprocal" tariff pause caused a rebound in the market.

• Republicans included a major victory for AI companies in Trump's sweeping "Big Beautiful Bill."
• One provision would prohibit states from regulating artificial intelligence for a decade.
• OpenAI and other companies have opposed state-level regulations.

Major tech companies could receive an unexpected victory in President Donald Trump's signature "Big Beautiful Bill" but they shouldn't start celebrating just yet.

House Republicans squeezed a provision into part of the sweeping tax, immigration, and defense legislation, which would prohibit states from regulating artificial intelligence for a decade.

"Except as provided in paragraph (2), no State or political subdivision thereof may enforce any law or regulation regulating artificial intelligence models, artificial intelligence systems, or automated decision systems during the 10-year period beginning on the date of the enactment this Act," the bill reads.

The text, first noticed by 404 Media, would be a godsend to major tech companies that have pushed the White House to oppose state-level AI regulations. Meta previously told the White House that such regulations "could impede innovation and investment."

OpenAI, Meta, and Alphabet have all opposed state-led efforts to regulate the rapidly growing industry. Last year, California Gov. Gavin Newsom vetoed what would have been one of the nation's furthest-reaching AI laws after it overwhelmingly passed the state legislature. OpenAI was among the leading tech companies to oppose that bill.

Congress has considered federal AI policies but those efforts have yet to go anywhere.

Big Tech CEOs have made substantial efforts to curry favor with the White House. Trump has welcomed their overtures and named venture capitalist David Sacks as artificial intelligence and crypto czar.

Republicans have mixed views on the proposal

There's no unanimity about the provision among congressional Republicans, even among those who are Big Tech critics.

Sen. Josh Hawley of Missouri told BI that he opposed the proposed moratorium, saying he didn't "want to tamp down on people's efforts to address" issues posed by AI.

"I would think that, just as a matter of federalism, we'd want states to be able to try out different regimes that they think will work for their state," Hawley said. "And I think in general, on AI, I do think we need some sensible oversight that will protect people's liberties."

Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas, meanwhile, told BI he was "very supportive of the principle," saying that AI should be regulated via national standards.

He also said he wanted to take an approach to AI similar to the one President Bill Clinton took on the internet in the 1990s — applying a "light touch regulatory approach" in order to win the AI race.

Silicon Valley shouldn't be celebrating yet.

The House Energy and Commerce Committee will debate the provision and the rest of its section of the sweeping proposal on Tuesday. Other top House committees will need to approve their own language before a final bill can be brought to the floor. House Republicans are still divided on other matters, including to what extent to cut Medicaid, a federal program that covers 72 million Americans, predominantly with low incomes or disabilities.

Even if the AI provision passes the House, it still needs to pass a special parliamentary review in the Senate. To ram Trump's bill through expected Democratic opposition, Republicans must use a special procedure known as reconciliation. The trade-off is that all provisions of reconciliation bills must be primarily fiscal in nature.

It's unlikely, as Bloomberg News reported, that the AI provision would meet that high bar. If it fails to, Republicans would be forced to strip it out of the bill or risk losing the special power that allows them to doge a likely Democratic-led filibuster that would effectively kill the entire bill.

"I don't know whether that provision will survive on reconciliation, but as a substantive matter, it's a policy I support," Cruz said.

• Republicans are officially planning to kill the IRS free direct tax-filing tool.
• Trump's "big beautiful bill" includes a provision to terminate the program.
• Republicans have described the tool as wasteful and an example of government overreach.

If Republicans on Capitol Hill get their way, the IRS's free direct tax-filing tool is going away for good.

A 389-page tax bill released by House Republicans on Tuesday includes a provision directing the Secretary of the Treasury to terminate IRS Direct File within 30 days of the bill's passage.

It's not a huge surprise. The program already seemed to be in trouble, with a Treasury official telling BI in April that it was a failed and disappointing program.

Republicans have argued that the tool, which was rolled out in 2024, is wasteful and an example of government overreach. Democrats, on the other hand, have contended that the program represents exactly the kind of government-efficiency project that DOGE should be interested in.

The bill, a key element of what President Donald Trump and congressional Republicans have deemed the "One Big Beautiful Bill," is set to be marked up in the House Ways and Means Committee on Tuesday.

The fiscal bill, the centerpiece of Trump's legislative agenda, could face tweaks as Republicans in both chambers hash out differences among themselves over the next several weeks.

The White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment. A spokesperson for Ways and Means Committee Chair Jason Smith referred BI to a June 2024 statement from the Missouri Republican that criticized the program.

"This latest attempt to circumvent Congress and establish a new tax program only serves to further undermine the fraying trust between the agency and the public," Smith said at the time.

The bill also allocates $15 million to study the creation of a new public-private partnership to provide free tax filing for up to 70% of taxpayers. That program would replace both IRS Direct File and other free tax filing services.

• For weeks, Marjorie Taylor Greene was the only lawmaker known to have traded on tariff turmoil.
• Now, she has company: Democratic Rep. Jared Moskowitz bought stocks just days before Trump's pause.
• Both lawmakers say that their stock trades are made by an outside financial advisor.

Rep. Jared Moskowitz hasn't been happy about how stocks have fared under President Donald Trump's new tariff regime. That didn't stop the Florida Democrat from profiting off of it.

According to a new disclosure, the congressman bought the dip, purchasing between $20,000 and $300,000 in 20 different companies on April 7, when the market was in turmoil and stock prices were low as a result of Trump's April 2 tariff announcement.

Lawmakers are only required to disclose the range of the value of stocks they purchase. Moskowitz disclosed 20 different purchases valued between $1,000 and $15,000.

The same day Moskowitz made those trades, he bemoaned the downturn, asking in a post on X whether it was possible to "bring back the old stock market" like a gene-editing startup brought back the long-extinct dire wolf.

It was a well-timed trade. Two days later, Trump announced a 90-day pause on his "reciprocal" tariffs, and stock prices shot back up.

Moskowitz is the second member of Congress to disclose purchasing a significant amount of stock during the tariff-induced early April dip in the market. Others could do so before the end of the month: Lawmakers have 30-45 days to report their stock trades.

For weeks, Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene was the only member of Congress known to have bought the dip. She purchased tens of thousands of dollars in stock on April 2, April 8, and April 9.

Democrats have insinuated that the Georgia Republican may have known about Trump's April 9 announcement and engaged in a form of insider trading. Greene has denied any wrongdoing, saying that her stocks are managed by a financial advisor who made a smart trade.

As a Democrat, Moskowitz is unlikely to have had prior knowledge of Trump's planning around tariffs, but his colleagues have criticized the practice of trading off the tariff turmoil in general.

"We're here to be public servants," Democratic Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York told BI in April. "And frankly, I don't care if Democrats did it. I don't care if Republicans did it. We're not here to feed at the trough."

A spokesperson for Moskowitz told BI in an email on Monday that all of the congressman's trades are also "managed by an outside third-party financial advisor." The Florida Democrat recently signed onto the TRUST in Congress Act, a bipartisan bill that would require lawmakers to either divest from their stock holdings or place them into a blind trust.

The spokesperson also noted that Moskowitz has cosponsored legislation to reclaim congressional authority over tariffs.

Moskowitz's April 7 purchase included shares of companies like Amazon, Lockheed Martin, NVIDIA, and Oracle. The congressman also disclosed selling between $1,000 and $15,000 apiece in Lincoln Electric Holdings and NextEra Energy that same day.

The movement to ban lawmakers from trading stocks has picked up steam in recent weeks. Trump said he would sign a bill to ban stock trading on Capitol Hill, and Democratic leaders in particular have begun to lean into the issue.

House Speaker Mike Johnson recently said he was "open to the conversation," but declined to fully back the idea.

• Mike Johnson says he's "open to the conversation" about banning stock trading in Congress.
• That doesn't mean it's going to happen anytime soon.
• Here's where things currently stand.

You may have heard this story before: The Speaker of the House is open to the idea of banning members of Congress from trading stocks, but it's not exactly clear whether it will happen.

That's where we were three years ago, when then-Speaker Nancy Pelosi — after initially causing a firestorm by rejecting the idea — told reporters that she was "okay with that" if that's what her colleagues wanted to do.

That's where we are again, with Speaker Mike Johnson telling NPR earlier this month that he's "open to the conversation."

"It's been talked about for quite some time," Johnson observed. "But there's probably a reason that the bill hasn't moved in all those years because there's never been a consensus built around it."

Johnson is correct. Despite the broad popularity of banning members of Congress from trading stocks — along with renewed interest driven by scrutiny of recent trades made by lawmakers like Republican Reps. Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia and Rob Bresnahan of Pennsylvania — the task of actually passing a bill to do it has never been straightforward.

As of now, there are several proposals in both chambers that would address the issue, and each one is a little bit different. There's the question of whether spouses should be included in a ban. There are differing views about the feasibility of using blind trusts. And if someone violates the rules, what should be the punishment?

These are all solvable questions, and during the last Congress, a group of senators with dueling bills managed to come together around a common proposal. But we're in a new Congress now, and lawmakers have largely returned to introducing their own bills.

It's also a matter of prioritization.

Sure, politicians ranging from President Donald Trump, to House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, to Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York, to Sen. Josh Hawley of Missouri all support the idea. But it's ultimately up to GOP leaders like Johnson and Senate Minority Leader John Thune — who told NPR that the current rules around stock trading disclosures are "pretty good" already — to decide it's an issue worth taking up.

In the meantime, they're spending most of their time trying to muscle through a sweeping fiscal bill that's set to include changes to the tax code and spending cuts.

Even if Johnson and Thune decide it's important, success isn't guaranteed.

In 2022, Pelosi and House Democratic leaders ultimately did move towards a vote on banning members of Congress from trading stocks, only to yank the bill due to internal opposition.

This year, it may take pressure from Johnson's right flank to spur Congress to action.

"It's been sitting out there for three or four years, we kind of keep dragging feet, and it's time to deal with it," Republican Rep. Chip Roy of Texas told BI in January.

• Trump said on Friday that the GOP "should probably not" raise taxes on the rich.
• He argued that if they did so, Democrats would use it against them.
• Democrats have long supported raising taxes on the wealthy.

President Donald Trump says he'd be fine raising taxes on rich people like him, but he's still warning his party not to do it.

In a Truth Social post on Friday morning, Trump said that Republicans "should probably not" increase taxes on the wealthy, but said he's "OK if they do!!!"

Trump's missive came one day after multiple outlets reported that he had urged House Speaker Mike Johnson to create a new tax bracket for those making more than $2.5 million per year, raising the rate they pay from 37% to 39.6%.

Republicans on Capitol Hill are currently working on a sweeping bill that will include changes to the tax code and cuts to government spending.

Trump suggested that Democrats would try to make Republicans pay politically for a tax hike on the rich, despite the fact that Democrats have generally long supported increasing taxes on the wealthy.

The president referenced President George H.W. Bush's 1988 pledge not to raise taxes, which he ultimately broke during a budget negotiation with Congress in 1990.

"The Radical Left Democrat Lunatics would go around screaming, 'Read my lips,' the fabled Quote by George Bush the Elder that is said to have cost him the Election," Trump said, adding: "NO, Ross Perot cost him the Election!"

• It's not just Elon Musk's planned step-back. DOGE-related initiatives are stalling in Congress, too.
• The DOGE caucus hasn't met in months, and the DOGE committee held an off-topic hearing.
• "The DOGE caucus in Congress is dead, it's defunct," one lawmaker said recently.

Everywhere you look in Washington, DOGE is beginning to slow down.

It's not just that Elon Musk is preparing to scale back his involvement in the project and devote more time to Tesla. Nor is it merely that Musk's estimated $2 trillion in cuts to the federal budget have shrunk to less than $200 billion. DOGE-related initiatives on Capitol Hill — where decisions about government spending are ultimately made — are also losing steam.

"That's one of my big frustrations right now," Republican Rep. Tim Burchett of Tennessee told BI. "The president's DOGE agenda is all through executive orders, and not through anything else."

A House caucus established to provide cost-cutting ideas to DOGE has had little interaction with the Trump administration. On Wednesday, a House panel created to support government efficiency efforts held a hearing on transgender athletes in fencing. And plans to vote on making DOGE cuts permanent have stalled as well.

Despite the shock and awe of Musk's first several weeks in government, time has shown that DOGE is still subject to the laws of political gravity. Musk has become unpopular, DOGE has faced massive blowback from the public, and Tesla — the source of most of Musk's wealth — has become the target of protests.

The substance of Musk's project is also at risk. Though Congress has largely taken a backseat to the executive branch in the initial months of President Donald Trump's term, the legislative branch will have to act to ensure that any changes made by DOGE aren't reversible by the next administration.

'We're not even going to call it the DOGE subcommittee anymore'

For months, the House Oversight Subcommittee on Delivering on Government Efficiency — aka, the DOGE subcommittee — has been the main forum for Republicans and Democrats to hash out DOGE-related topics in a public forum. It's held hearings on improper payments, USAID, funding for NPR and PBS, and whether the federal government should downsize its real estate portfolio.

On Wednesday, the subcommittee departed from that course, holding a hearing on transgender athletes participating in fencing competitions.

Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia, the chairwoman of the subcommittee, said ahead of the hearing that the topic was tied to government efficiency because Trump signed an executive order aimed at barring transgender women from competing in women's sports.

During the hearing, several Democrats on the committee argued that the hearing was off-topic.

"We're not even going to call it the DOGE subcommittee anymore. This is called the fencing oversight committee," Rep. Melanie Stansbury of New Mexico, the top Democrat on the panel, said mockingly. "Welcome to the fencing oversight committee."

Republicans on the subcommittee largely demurred when asked about the apparent off-topic nature of the hearing. "Yeah, I don't know," Burchett said. "You know, people are concerned about it."

Meanwhile, the House DOGE caucus — a bipartisan group that boasts nearly 80 members — has been far less active than originally envisioned. Leaders told BI in January that the group planned to release a report at the end of the first quarter that compiled cost-saving suggestions for the White House and Musk.

But the group hasn't met in months, and Republican Rep. Blake Moore of Utah, one of the group's three co-chairs, told BI that the plans for a report had been delayed.

"There just hasn't been a lot of interaction with us and the administration," Moore said.

Rep. Jared Moskowitz of Florida, one of a handful of Democrats who had joined the group, went even further in a recent CNN interview. "The DOGE caucus in Congress is dead, it's defunct," Moskowitz said. "It met twice, I was there, it never met again. They weren't included in any conversations."

As of now, Moore said, members have been left waiting for the White House to submit a request asking Congress to withdraw funding that lawmakers had previously approved, known as a "rescission."

The administration had planned to ask lawmakers to cut funding for USAID, NPR, and PBS, according to various reports. But now that's also been put on hold, and the White House did not respond to a request for comment on when the recission request would be made.

"Our focus is just, at this point, going to be on what rescissions ultimately come," Moore said. "But there's been a major delay in that, so it's kind of waiting to see what legislative action happens."

• In a new interview, Bill Gates criticized both Elon Musk and DOGE.
• The Microsoft cofounder said that DOGE is "geographically illiterate."
• He said that Musk was "involved in the deaths of the world's poorest children" by cutting USAID.

Bill Gates sharply criticized Elon Musk in an interview with The New York Times published on Thursday, calling out the Tesla cofounder's role in cutting foreign aid as part of his Department of Government Efficiency initiative.

The Microsoft cofounder said that cuts made to foreign aid, particular programs administered by the now-shuttered US Agency for International Development, were "stunning."

"He's the one who cut the USAID budget. He put it in the wood chipper, because he didn't go to a party that weekend," Gates told the Times of Musk. "The world's richest man has been involved in the deaths of the world's poorest children."

Gates also referred to an instance early in President Donald Trump's term in which administration officials said that the US had been sending condoms to Gaza via foreign aid. In reality, the US had been providing contraceptives to a province in the African country of Mozambique.

"They cut the money to Gaza Province in Mozambique. That is really for drugs, so mothers don't give their babies HIV," Gates said. "But the people doing the cutting are so geographically illiterate, they think it's Gaza and condoms. Will they go meet those babies who got HIV because that money was cut? Probably not."

Gates made the remarks as he discussed his plans to give away the remainder of his wealth over the next 20 years before closing his foundation in 2045.

The Gates Foundation has invested heavily in public health initiatives around the world, often focusing on childhood diseases.

This isn't the first time Gates has been critical of Musk — or vice versa.

Gates has argued that Musk has destabilized the politics of foreign countries through his support for right-wing causes in the United Kingdom and Germany. He's also said that while he believes Tesla is having a positive environmental impact, he wishes Musk were more outspoken about the climate crisis.

Musk, in turn, has said that Gates has a "limited" understanding of artificial intelligence.

Musk, DOGE, Tesla, and the White House did not respond to requests for comment from Business Insider.

• In a hearing on Wednesday, Democrats suggested that Marjorie Taylor Greene engaged in insider trading.
• It caused the hearing to be suspended for 20 minutes.
• Greene's trades during the April tariff dip have drawn scrutiny from Democrats.

Democrats suggested that Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene engaged in insider trading at a House hearing on Wednesday, derailing the proceedings for roughly 20 minutes.

The DOGE subcommittee, which is chaired by the Georgia Republican, was holding a hearing on transgender athletes competing in fencing and other sports.

As Democrats on the panel criticized Greene, two of them — Reps. Greg Casar and Jasmine Crockett, both of Texas — brought up recent stock trades made by the congresswoman.

"We're here because Chairwoman Marjorie Taylor Greene thinks that if she picks on vulnerable people like trans folks, she can avoid having a discussion about the allegations of insider trading against her," Casar said.

Greene purchased tens of thousands of dollars in stock in an array of companies between April 2 and 9, when President Donald Trump's tariff announcement and subsequent pause led to large shifts in the stock market. The congresswoman has maintained that the trades were made by an independent financial advisor.

"That's something that my portfolio manager does for me, and he did a great job," the congresswoman told the Georgia Recorder last month. "Guess what he did? He bought the dip."

Democrats have argued that Greene and other Republicans close to Trump may have known about the president's tariff moves ahead of time, allowing them to profit from non-public information.

When Crockett brought up Greene's trades, she displayed a poster featuring the congresswoman's face.

"Let's look at fraud," Crockett said. "We could investigate whether the White House and members of this subcommittee engaged in insider trading and market manipulation. Maybe it's a coincidence that the chairwoman brought hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of stock the day before Trump announced a 90-day pause on tariffs, but I guess we'll never know."

Republican Rep. Nancy Mace of South Carolina then asked to take Crockett's words down, saying the Texas congresswoman was "alleging a criminal act." That led to the committee suspending its business to review Crockett's remarks.

Eventually, Greene called the meeting back to order.

The Georgia Republican asked Mace to withdraw her motion, saying the Texas Democrat's remarks were "borderline" and that it was important to move on "in the interest of making sure that we stay on track, instead of getting sidetracked by Democrats' non-stop fake accusations."

• Donald Trump is blaming Joe Biden for the state of the stock market.
• For now, his GOP allies on Capitol Hill are playing along.
• "That will work now," one Republican senator said. "It won't work six months from now."

Donald Trump says the state of the stock market, more than 100 days into his presidency, is his predecessor's fault. For now, his GOP allies on Capitol Hill are playing along.

"That will work now," Sen. Thom Tillis of North Carolina told reporters. "It won't work six months from now."

Stocks fell significantly on Wednesday following the news that for the first time in three years, the US economy is contracting. In the first three months of 2025, US real gross domestic product fell at an annualized rate of 0.3%, compared with 2.4% growth in the final quarter of 2024.

That led Trump to blame former President Joe Biden. "This is Biden's Stock Market, not Trump's," the president wrote on Truth Social. "Our Country will boom, but we have to get rid of the Biden 'Overhang.'"

It's not the first time that a president — rightly or wrongly — has blamed their predecessor for the state of the economy.

But it's particularly hard for Trump to blame Biden for the state of the stock market, given that the president's tariff policies have caused rapid fluctuations in the market in recent weeks.

Trump also sought credit when stocks were performing well under Biden in early 2024, arguing that investors were expecting him to win.

In the midst of a dip in the stock market at the beginning of April, Sen. John Kennedy of Louisiana vigorously agreed with a CNN interviewer that Trump is responsible for the economy.

"There's no question," Kennedy said on April 7. "I think once he decided to add the tariffs, clearly, I mean, he will be held responsible, as he should, whether it turns out good or it turns out badly."

On Wednesday, Kennedy stopped short of reaffirming his prior statement. But he did say that higher imports, driven in part by businesses trying to get ahead of Trump's tariffs, may have led to a lower GDP number.

"When you make the changes to our trading system that are this dramatic, you're not going to really know the impact on your economy for four to six months," Kennedy said.

That leads to the question of when, exactly, a president can no longer reasonably attribute the state of the economy to his predecessor.

For Trump, it may be another three months. "You could even say the next quarter is sort of Biden," the president said at a Cabinet meeting later on Wednesday.

Most GOP senators who spoke with BI declined to provide a specific timeframe for when Trump should assume full responsibility for the state of the economy, though Sen. Bernie Moreno of Ohio offered that it would take about two years for Trump's new policies to fully make their mark.

"You typically judge a president after about two years," Moreno said. "It takes time. It takes more than 100 days."

"I think Joe Biden and the Democrats did enormous damage to the economy for four years," Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas told BI. "It takes longer than a couple of months to turn that around."