Two days ago when we reported that the Illinois House had voted 72-45 to pass a 32% income tax hike (and a $36 billion spending plan), in an last ditch scramble to provide the state with its first budget in three years (or else suffer the first ever US downgrade to "Junk"), we said that "ultimately, the fate of Illinois' credit rating is now in the hands of Rauner, and whether and how fast his imminent veto is overriden."
With the CBO warning that the Treasury is on track to run out of cash in less than four months, Republicans are facing a difficult internecine struggle to raise the debt limits as both conservatives and moderates demand riders that stipulate how the money can be spent.
Despite President Trump's ever-optimistic overtures that something 'great' will happen with the GOP healthcare reform bill, Senator Rand Paul is dropping some painful truth bombs this morning on Fox News, warning "I don't think we're getting anywhere with the bill we have."
At some point, either today or tomorrow, Senate Republicans must hold a procedural vote on Obamacare if they have prayer of passing the legislation before the July 4th recess, a stated goal of Senate Majority Lead Mitch McConnell. The procedural vote will kick off 20 hours of required debate and flurry of amendments so if it slips beyond tomorrow then the whole repeal process will almost certainly slip as well. According to The Hill, at least four Republican Senators are currently opposed to the motion to proceed:
The CBO has scored the Senate version of the healthcare bill, which was passed by the House as H.R.1628, and found a few more modest improvements relative to its scoring of the Healthcare Bill as of May 24 . Here are the apples to apples comparisons with the last proposed version of the bill: