Trump and Johnson get BBB over a major hurdle and move on to the House floor

Donald Trump and Mike Johnson won a long-suffering victory to get the Big and Beautiful Bill(BBB) to continue moving through the House of Representatives. After a night of intense negotiations and a late and dramatic vote of more than five hours, finallythe rule moved to floor debatefor a final vote after getting all but one Republican congressman to give the green light for the legislative process to continue.

Republican leaders knew that the BBB's path in the House after its passage through the Senatewas not going to be a bed of roses, and soon the rebels made it clear to them that they were not wrong. Despite the haste with which the speaker wanted to organize the paperwork to move the law forward and have it approved on Wednesday itself -with lawmakers driving up to 14 hoursto get there on time-, members of the GOP's hard wing voiced their opposition by voting against it in the Rules Committee.

Stiff resistance from minute 1 from the GOP hard wing.

While it may have seemed a symbolic gesture, since the rulepassed the floor by 7-6, those two votes represented a much broader group that could block the rule in the next steps. To make matters worse, several moderates also expressed doubts over what they saw as excessive cuts in Medicaid, for example.

Johnsonwithheld the timing of the vote as long as possible, but always with an eye on getting the BBB on the president's desk on July 4 for his signature. For hours, he and the other party leaders in the House were negotiating with the rebels, and several of them even had an appointment with Trumpat the White House.

A late and lengthy vote

Finally, he called late into the night the plenary vote to vote on the rule governing the debate and final approval. At first, with all 212 Democrats voting against, the math didn't add up for BBB proponents. Only 207 of the conservative lawmakers gave their support to the rule, with 9 not voting and 4 votes against.

Trump offered the speaker to personally call the rebels, but Johnson said it was up to them and that the president "had already done his job." There was a small glimmer of hope when David Valadao, a moderate California Republican who had expressed fears about the impact of the cuts on his constituents, finally voted yes.

Trump takes command of negotiations

It was a mirage, because, almost immediately, Trump's bête noire in the House, Thomas Massie, changed his initial "yes" to "no." That prompted Trump to decide to take command of the negotiations and arranged a phone call with the rebels in a room in Congress.

A little more than two hours later, the congressmen returned to the House. In an unusual gesture, Johnson gathered the group of Republicans who were resisting a vote on the floor andprayed togethershortly before proceeding to the close of the vote. The vote then proceeded, with all Republicans except Brian Fitzpatrick of Pennsylvania giving the green light to proceed.