STAT+: House panel tees up debate over cutting Medicaid to pay for tax breaks

In a party-line vote late Thursday, the House Budget Committee passed a budget blueprint that tees up the debate over tax cuts and how to pay for them, which is expected to include cuts to Medicaid.

The House budget resolution bill sets the levels for minimum spending cuts and a maximum deficit increase for each committee under the budget reconciliation process. That process allows some bills to be passed with a simple majority, allowing Republicans to go it alone, as long as the party can wrangle most of its members.

There is a lot of pressure to make big cuts to government spending. The Treasury Department estimates that renewing the expiring individual and estate tax provisions would cost $4.2 trillion between 2026 and 2035. A group of nine Senate Republicans, including Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.) and Finance Committee Chair Mike Crapo (R-Idaho), released a letter on Thursday that insists on permanent tax cuts, which would cost even more than temporarily extending them. 

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