Principals

1. House takes up megabill
2. How Thune did it
3. Gaza ceasefire movement
4. Tariff deadline nears
5. Paramount settles with Trump
6. Trump-Musk feud 2.0
7. GOP vs. DC

PDB: US halts some weapons deliveries for Ukraine

ADP to release private-sector employment data … Tesla reports quarterly deliveries … Dalai Lama confirms he’ll have a successor

Republican megabill faces tallest hurdle yet

It’s a make-or-break day for President Donald Trump and House Speaker Mike Johnson as their teams look to muscle the party’s mammoth tax-and-spending bill through the House as-is. This is their last hurdle and also, potentially, their tallest: The version the Senate passed Tuesday irked both conservatives and moderates by trimming less in spending and more from Medicaid, respectively. With votes expected as soon as this afternoon, leaders are also watching closely to see if the weather delays members’ flights. Trump has already begun working the phones, according to an administration official, as have others in the White House, like Office of Management and Budget Director Russ Vought. Those on the front lines are projecting optimism: House Ways and Means Chair Jason Smith — who’s huddled with Vice President JD Vance to strategize, according to a person familiar — told reporters the Senate “struck a very good balance.”

— Eleanor Mueller and Shelby Talcott

How Thune saved Trump’s bill

Tuesday’s vote was a big victory for Senate Majority Leader John Thune, who reflected on the grind of getting the tax bill past GOP divisions and across the finish line in an interview with Semafor’s Burgess Everett. Thune ended up shaping a more conservative bill than the one passed by the House, insisting “that was the consensus.” He shepherded the legislation through by attending to moderates like Sen. Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska, who didn’t love the hurried process but felt heard by the majority leader. There were blemishes along the way — the decision of Sen. Thom Tillis, R-N.C., to retire in the middle of debate exposed real Republican worries about Medicaid cuts. Thune also had to contend with Trump’s penchant of talking to, well, everyone. “I have to ensure that he’s hearing the other side of the argument,” Thune said.

Trump claims Gaza ceasefire progress

Trump said Israel had agreed to a 60-day Gaza ceasefire and piled pressure on Hamas to accept a deal. Israel is yet to confirm Trump’s announcement, while Hamas said it was “ready and serious regarding reaching an agreement” but repeated its demand the war end. Earlier, Israel’s United Nations ambassador told the BBC that the country is ready for a truce, but only when all surviving hostages taken on Oct. 7, 2023 are brought home. Trump urged Hamas to take the offer brokered by Qatar and Egypt “because it will not get better — IT WILL ONLY GET WORSE.” Israel’s campaign in Gaza, however, showed no sign of relenting: At least 20 Palestinians were killed in an air strike on a café Monday, according to witnesses, and Israel ordered further evacuations in the north of the enclave.

One week for trade progress

The Trump administration is quickly shifting its focus to trade ahead of next week’s fast-approaching July 9 deadline for higher tariffs. “We’ll do trade next week,” Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said on Fox News, adding the administration is “very close” to an agreement with India. Other deals look much less likely: The EU is demanding “immediate relief” from levies in certain sectors, Reuters reported, and Trump is doubting talks with Japan.

The Federal Reserve expects tariffs to show up in summer prices, Chair Jerome Powell said, as he maintained his wait-and-see approach on rate cuts. “We went on hold when we saw the size of the tariffs,” he said during an ECB panel. Markets had a mixed reaction to the Senate’s passage of the tax-cuts bill, the price tag of which raises “the risk of a debt crisis,” The New York Times writes.

Paramount settlement shows Trump’s leverage

CBS News owner Paramount will pay $16 million to settle Trump’s lawsuit over the editing of an interview with Kamala Harris on 60 Minutes. The money, which will be split between paying Trump’s legal fees and his presidential library, is the latest sign of the president’s leverage over big American companies. Lawyers believed Trump’s case had little legal merit, but Paramount’s owners are trying to sell the company to Skydance — and worried that Trump’s hostility could get in the way of the deal. Paramount’s key shareholder Shari Redstone’s scrutiny of 60 Minutes also prompted its executive producer to resign. The deal eases the path for a new owner, Skydance, bankrolled by Trump ally and Oracle chief Larry Ellison. Trump’s legal team said in a statement Trump is “holding the Fake News media accountable for their lying and deceit.”

— Ben Smith

Trump, Musk resume their public feud

The Donald Trump-Elon Musk ceasefire lasted a little less than a month, to the dismay of White House officials who’d hoped the drama had been put to bed. Musk reprised his criticism of Trump’s megabill, blasting its targeting of clean energy and promising to help primary Republicans who decide to back it. Musk even hinted at donating to Rep. Thomas Massie, R-Ky., an object of Trump’s ire due to his opposition to the bill. “An interesting thing just happened,” Massie wrote on X in response.

The president replied to Musk’s attacks by first suggesting DOGE look into cutting subsidies for Musk’s companies and then opening the door to deporting Musk, who is from South Africa but is a naturalized US citizen. While lawmakers might be tuning out, a new survey indicates Tesla’s popularity is plummeting among Republicans, Semafor’s Liz Hoffman scooped, and its shares have tanked.

— Shelby Talcott

DC becomes GOP’s favorite target

Republicans who’ve made a habit of using their power over DC to undercut progressive policymaking there are mounting a new push to rein in the capital — and this one may have legs. Sen. John Fetterman, D-Pa., told Semafor’s David Weigel that he is inclined to support a House-passed bill that would bar noncitizens from serving in local office as well as voting locally in the city that lawmakers call a home away from home. The bill passed the House with 56 Democratic votes in June. A similar ban passed last year with support from two Democrats who’ve since ascended to the Senate (though it’s unclear how they’d vote this time). For some local politicians, the legislation would hit home in a serious way. It would remove two members of the local Advisory Neighborhood Commission, in addition to kicking them off voter rolls.

Blindspot: Voting and Noem

Stories that are being largely ignored by either left-leaning or right-leaning outlets, curated with help from our partners at Ground News.

What the Left isn’t reading: Republicans sued Arizona over a law that allows certain out-of-country US voters to cast ballots in the state.

What the Right isn’t reading: Kristi Noem took $80,000 from a nonprofit boosting her political fortunes and failed to disclose it when she was selected to lead the Department of Homeland Security, ProPublica reported.

Beltway Newsletters

Punchbowl News: As members of the House GOP whip team take the temperature of members on the Senate-passed megabill, they’re “racking up no’s from lawmakers who they didn’t expect would be opposed to the bill.”

Axios: “Could this not work out the way we want it to? Yes,” one adviser to President Trump acknowledged of the megabill.

Playbook: The real battle over the bill is going to be about messaging. Trump pollster Tony Fabrizio tested messaging around the massive tax cut-and-spending bill, finding that it gets a positive response when framed as the “Working Families Tax Cuts (WFTC).”

WaPo: Democrats are still grappling with the ramifications of the “defund the police” movement.

White House

• President Trump spoke approvingly of daughter-in-law Lara Trump as a potential replacement for retiring Sen. Thom Tillis, R-N.C.
• A man charged with inciting rioters on Jan. 6, 2021, has been named as an aide to Ed Martin, the director of the Justice Department’s “weaponization” task force.

Congress

• A last-minute change to the Senate megabill meant to exempt Alaska from a provision punishing states with high rates of SNAP fraud has the effect of incentivizing those states to keep their error rates high. — HuffPost
• Lawmakers quietly nixed a provision to bar Medicaid from covering gender-related health care for transgender people from the Senate megabill, after the measure incurred a Byrd Rule violation. — NOTUS

Outside the Beltway