PHOENIX (AP) — Top Arizona Democrats said Tuesday they will bypass the financially strained state party and its embattled new chairman in next year’s midterms, as they looked to assure donors and activists that party dysfunction won’t hamper their efforts to win in the battleground state.

Gov. Katie Hobbs, Secretary of State Adrian Fontes and Attorney General Kris Mayes — who all are seeking second terms next year — said grassroots organizing will be outsourced to a small county organization rather than the Arizona Democratic Party.

The workaround comes as party disarray threatens to complicate Democrats’ efforts to hold on to a decade of successes in a state long dominated by Republicans. Arizona has no Senate contest next year but will have at least two battleground U.S. House races, and the campaigns for governor, other top state offices and legislature could dictate how Arizona handles the 2028 presidential election.

National Democratic committees, including the Democratic Governors Association, signed on to the move.

Conflict with Arizona Democratic state party

Arizona Democrats unexpectedly ousted former Chair Yolanda Bejarano after the party’s disastrous showing in the 2024 election, when Donald Trump won the state after losing it to Joe Biden in 2020. New Chairman Robert Branscomb promptly fired most of the senior staff.

Behind-the-scenes tension exploded into public view in April. Branscromb sent a letter to members of the state Democratic committee blasting Sens. Mark Kelly and Ruben Gallego, a highly unusual move against the state’s top Democrats.

Kelly, Gallego, Hobbs, Fontes and Mayes responded with their own letter saying they’d lost trust in Branscomb.

Last month, the party’s treasurer warned that Branscomb was spending more money than he was raising and the party was on track to run out of money by the end of the year. Meanwhile, the party is operating without a budget approved by the executive committee.

Allies of Branscomb, the party’s first Black chair, have said the pressure on him is racially motivated. He faces a potential ouster later this month but has refused to step aside.

After Tuesday’s announcement, Branscomb projected a united front with the officials who spurned him, predicting the split would not hold back Democrats.

“I think the people are ready to solidify our democracy, and democrats are in a position to win up and down the ticket,” he said. “Because we’re focused on different areas doesn’t mean we’re not together.”

Navajo County Democrats to run get-out-the-vote

The Arizona Democratic Party has traditionally housed the coordinated get-out-the-vote campaign designed to turn out voters for Democratic candidates up and down the ballot. Hobbs, Fontes and Mayes said Tuesday they’ll run it instead through the Navajo County Democratic Party for 2026.

Democrats are well-organized in Navajo County, which is small by population but large geographically in rural northeastern Arizona. The party has long invested in organizing there among Native American voters.

The county party can do most everything the state party can do, with one major exception—only the state party can send mail at a discounted postal rate. Branscomb said that won’t be an issue.

“We’ll still cooperate and work together on this,” he said. “We all have the same vision, we all have the same goal to get them all re-elected.”

Running a statewide campaign through a county party is not without precedent. Former Sen. John McCain leaned on the Yuma County GOP in his 2010 re-election campaign after a faction hostile to him took control of the Arizona Republican Party. In Nevada, Sen. Catherine Cortez-Masto ran her 2022 coordinated campaign through the Washoe County Democratic Party after progressives took control of the state party.

In this case, the rupture between the officials and the party is not driven by ideology but by concerns of mismanagement and financial constraints.

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Jonathan J. Cooper, The Associated Press

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Justice Department is ramping up its plans to revoke the citizenship of immigrants who’ve committed crimes or pose a national security risk, according to a recent memo underscoring the Trump administration’s hardline immigration agenda.

Efforts to identity and go after those suspected of cheating to get their citizenship are not new to this administration.

But the public push is raising concerns from advocates, who have accused the administration of trying to use immigration enforcement for political purposes. It’s receiving increased scrutiny after a Republican member of Congress suggested that Zohran Mamdani, the New York City Democratic mayoral candidate, should be subject to denaturalization proceedings.

Here’s a look at the denaturalization process and what the Justice Department’s memo means:

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Denaturalization cases are rare

The U.S. government can strip a naturalized immigrant of their citizenship if they are criminally convicted of naturalization fraud or if the government proves through civil proceedings that they illegally obtained their citizenship through fraud or misrepresented or concealed facts on their application.

For years, the government’s denaturalization efforts focused largely on suspected war criminals who lied on their immigration paperwork, most notably former Nazis. The Justice Department filed just more than 300 total cases between 1990 and 2017.

An initiative that began under the Obama administration called Operation Janus expanded those efforts by seeking to identify people who had used different identities to get green cards and citizenship after they were previously issued deportation orders.

In 2016, an internal watchdog reported that 315,000 old fingerprint records for immigrants who had been deported or had criminal convictions had not been uploaded to a Department of Homeland Security database that is used to check immigrants’ identities. The same report found more than 800 immigrants had been ordered deported under one identity but became U.S. citizens under another.

The first Trump administration made such investigations a bigger priority, creating a Justice Department section focused on denaturalization cases.

But even then, the number of denaturalization cases remained small, as the administration didn’t have the resources to bring many amid an onslaught of legal challenges to immigration policies it had to defend against, said Matthew Hoppock, an attorney in Kansas who represents people in denaturalization cases.

Justice Department says it will prioritize certain cases

The push was announced in a memo from the recently confirmed head of the Justice Department’s Civil Division, Assistant Attorney General Brett Shumate. Shumate said the cases the department will prioritize include people who “pose a potential danger to national security,” people who commit violent crimes, members of gangs and drug cartels and people who commit Medicaid fraud and other types of fraud.

The benefits of the denaturalization process, Shumate wrote, “include the government’s ability to revoke the citizenship of individuals who engaged in the commission of war crimes, extrajudicial killings, or other serious human rights abuses; to remove naturalized criminals, gang members, or, indeed, any individuals convicted of crimes who pose an ongoing threat to the United States; and to prevent convicted terrorists from returning to U.S. soil or traveling internationally on a U.S. passport.”

Hoppock said the memo sort of “blows the doors open” for the administration to file as many as many denaturalization cases as it has the resources to file.

Lawyers raise alarm about the potential impact

The broad language in the memo raises the prospect “that any offense, at any time, may be used to justify denaturalization,” said Christopher Wellborn, president of the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers.

“It is not difficult to imagine a scenario where the government invokes unsubstantiated claims of gang affiliation or uses an individual’s criminal record to claim that citizenship was illegally procured,” Wellborn said in a statement.

Others worry the administration’s public push will stoke fear among naturalized immigrants.

“The more you talk about it, the more you frame it as ‘we’re coming after your naturalization, we’re coming after you,’ the more of a chilling effect we see on people applying for naturalization,” said Elizabeth Taufa, senior policy attorney and strategist at the Immigrant Legal Resource Center. “Even those folks that really are eligible for naturalization.”

Critics have accused the Trump administration using immigration enforcement to go after people because of their speech — most notably in the case of Columbia University activist Mahmoud Khalil, whom it has sought to deport over his role in pro-Palestinian protests.

“One of our ongoing concerns is will they target these politically, will they start combing through people’s immigration files if they don’t like you or if they think you don’t agree with the government,” Hoppock said.

“I think most Americans would support the idea of stripping someone of citizenship if they got it through fraud and they are also a dangerous person,” he said, but the concern is if they start going through “regular folks’ immigration files to find a T that is not crossed or an I that is not dotted so they can use it as a weapon.”

Justice Department recently secured denaturalization in one case

The department last month announced that it had successfully secured the denaturalization of a man who was convicted of possessing child sexual abuse material.

The British man had become a U.S. citizen after enlisting in the U.S. Army under a provision that provides a pathway to citizenship for U.S. service members, officials said. He only listed a speeding ticket when asked on his naturalization application if he had “ever committed a crime or offense for which you were not arrested,” and he became a U.S. citizen in 2013.

Months later, he was arrested in Louisiana on child sexual abuse material charges and convicted, according to the department.

“The laws intended to facilitate citizenship for brave men and women who join our nation’s armed forces will not shield individuals who have fraudulently obtained U.S. citizenship by concealing their crimes,” Shumate said in a statement at the time. “If you commit serious crimes before you become a U.S. citizen and then lie about them during your naturalization process, the Justice Department will discover the truth and come after you.”

Alanna Durkin Richer, The Associated Press

LOUISVILLE, Ky. (AP) — Republican businessman Nate Morris has declared that Kentucky Sen. Mitch McConnell doesn’t deserve a lifetime achievement award from their home state political party, as the first-time candidate ratchets up his attacks against the former Senate leader he hopes to succeed in next year’s election.

Morris, a tech entrepreneur, has turned McConnell into his own punching bag — a strategy seen as an attempt to reinforce his political outsider status and win over President Donald Trump’s MAGA base.

Morris launched his Senate campaign last week, joining U.S. Rep. Andy Barr and ex-state Attorney General Daniel Cameron as GOP heavyweights vying for their party’s nomination next spring. All three have ties to McConnell but have heaped praise on Trump in hopes of winning the president’s endorsement — seen as potentially decisive in the primary.

Going after Mitch

Doubling down on his anti-McConnell strategy, Morris called on the Kentucky Republican Party to rescind what he said is its plan to honor the senator with a lifetime achievement award at an event next month. Morris called on Cameron and Barr to join in declaring McConnell undeserving of the award.

Morris on Tuesday branded McConnell as “the face of the resistance inside the GOP to President Trump and the MAGA movement for the last five years.” The attack came as McConnell voted for Trump’s big tax breaks and spending cuts bill, while fellow Kentucky Republican Sen. Rand Paul opposed the bill.

“The choice is simple: You either stand with Trump or you stand with Mitch,” Morris said in the statement.

Asked to respond to Morris’ remarks, state Republican Party spokesman Andy Westberry said: “It’s my knowledge no official decisions or announcements have been made regarding awards.”

McConnell’s office did not comment on Morris’ barrage. During Trump’s first term, McConnell worked with the president to cut taxes and put conservatives on the federal bench, including three justices on the nine-member Supreme Court. Their relationship ruptured after McConnell blamed Trump for “disgraceful” acts in the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol attack, but the senator still endorsed Trump’s presidential run in 2024.

McConnell helped Kentucky punch about its weight

McConnell, the longest-serving Senate party leader in U.S. history, is widely seen as a guiding force in the GOP’s rise to dominance in Kentucky. He announced in February, on his 83rd birthday, that he wouldn’t seek reelection in 2026 and will retire when his current term ends.

His influence in the Bluegrass State is reflected in Frankfort at the state GOP headquarters, which is named for McConnell. McConnell has frequently said his leadership position enabled Kentucky to “punch above its weight,” as he steered federal funds back home to fix roads, build bridges, support universities, improve airports, combat drug abuse and more.

Morris has blasted McConnell for not being in lock-step with Trump. He pointed to McConnell voting against a handful of Trump’s second-term cabinet picks, opposing the president’s tariffs and resisting Trump’s efforts to “end the gravy train to Ukraine” in its war against Russia.

Morris also mentioned McConnell’s criticism of Trump in a biography of the Senate Republican leader by Michael Tackett, deputy Washington bureau chief of The Associated Press.

“Why are we celebrating a man who called President Trump a ‘despicable human being’?” Morris said.

Longtime Kentucky political commentator Al Cross said the anti-McConnell attacks are meant to burnish Morris’ profile as an outsider.

“If you are not well known at all, then one way to get well known is to attack someone who is very well known — and that is Mitch McConnell,” Cross said.

Morris bristled at a request from the state GOP chairman that Senate candidates not “speak ill” of fellow Republicans not involved in the Senate race. Morris said the request was in an invitation for him to speak at the upcoming GOP event and said he thinks it was meant to deter criticism of McConnell.

Westberry said the request was “just a suggestion,” one that was sent to other GOP Senate candidates invited to speak at the GOP function.

All three leading GOP Senate contenders have ties to McConnell. Cameron is a former McConnell aide, Barr has referred to the senator as a mentor and Morris worked as an intern in McConnell’s office.

Barr and Cameron question Morris’ authenticity as a MAGA loyalist. Cameron’s campaign on Tuesday focused on two hot-button issues for MAGA supporters — diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives and consideration of environmental, social and governance factors when making investment decisions.

“If I told you there’s a candidate running in the Republican primary who built his company on ESG subsidies and supporting DEI initiatives, you’d think I was joking,” Cameron’s campaign said Tuesday. “That candidate is Nate Morris, and he should start answering for his record.”

Morris’ campaign responded by referring to Cameron as “Mitch McConnell’s puppet.”

Bruce Schreiner, The Associated Press

WASHINGTON (AP) — The University of Pennsylvania has agreed to ban transgender women from its women’s sports teams to resolve a federal civil rights case that found the school violated the rights of female athletes.

The U.S. Education Department announced the voluntary agreement Tuesday. The case focused on Lia Thomas, the transgender swimmer who last competed for the Ivy League school in Philadelphia in 2022, when she became the first openly transgender athlete to win a Division I title.

It’s part of the Trump administration’s broader attempt to remove transgender athletes from girls’ and women’s sports.

Under the agreement, Penn agreed to restore all individual Division I swimming records and titles to female athletes who lost out to Thomas, the Education Department said. Penn also agreed to send a personalized apology letter to each of those swimmers.

It wasn’t immediately clear whether Thomas would be stripped of her awards and honors at Penn.

The university must also announce that it “will not allow males to compete in female athletic programs” and it must adopt “biology-based” definitions of male and female, the department said.

Education Secretary Linda McMahon called it a victory for women and girls.

“The Department commends UPenn for rectifying its past harms against women and girls, and we will continue to fight relentlessly to restore Title IX’s proper application and enforce it to the fullest extent of the law,” McMahon said in a statement.

The Education Department opened its investigation in February and concluded in April that Penn had violated Title IX, a 1972 law forbidding sex discrimination in education. Such findings have almost always been resolved through voluntary agreements. If Penn had fought the finding, the department could have moved to refer the case to the Justice Department or pursued a separate process to cut the school’s federal funding.

In February, the Education Department asked the NCAA and the National Federation of State High School Associations, or NFSHSA, to restore titles, awards and records it says have been “misappropriated by biological males competing in female categories.”

The most obvious target at the college level was in women’s swimming, where Thomas won the national title in the 500-yard freestyle in 2022.

The NCAA has updated its record books when recruiting and other violations have stripped titles from certain schools, but the organization, like the NFSHSA, has not responded to the federal government’s request. Determining which events had a transgender athlete participating years later would be challenging.

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The Associated Press’ education coverage receives financial support from multiple private foundations. AP is solely responsible for all content. Find AP’s standards for working with philanthropies, a list of supporters and funded coverage areas at AP.org.

Collin Binkley, The Associated Press

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Trump administration is withholding more than $6 billion in federal grants for afterschool and summer programs, English language instruction, adult literacy and more as part of a review to ensure grants align with President Donald Trump’s priorities.

The move leaves states and schools in limbo as they budget for programs this summer and in the upcoming school year, introducing new uncertainty about when — or if — they will receive the money. It also sets the stage for a clash with Democrats, who say the administration is flouting the law by holding back money Congress appropriated.

Without the money, schools say they won’t be able to provide free or affordable afterschool care for low-income kids while their parents work, and they may not be able to hire staff to teach children who are learning English.

Programs that rely on the funding were expecting it to be distributed July 1, but an Education Department notice issued Monday announced the money would not be released while the programs are under review. The department did not provide a timeline and warned “decisions have not yet been made” on grants for the upcoming school year.

“The Department remains committed to ensuring taxpayer resources are spent in accordance with the President’s priorities and the Department’s statutory responsibilities,” Education Department officials wrote in the notice, which was obtained by The Associated Press.

The department referred questions to the Office of Management and Budget, which did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Some advocates fear the grants are being targeted for elimination, which could force schools to cut programs and teachers. Trump’s 2026 budget proposal called for Congress to zero out all of the programs under review, signaling the administration sees them as unnecessary.

Sen. Patty Murray, D-Wash., pressed the administration to spend the money as Congress intended.

“Every day that this funding is held up is a day that school districts are forced to worry about whether they’ll have to cut back on afterschool programs or lay off teachers instead of worrying about how to make sure our kids can succeed,” Murray said in a statement.

A national organization for afterschool programs called the department’s action a “stunning betrayal.”

“Withholding these funds will cause lasting harm to students and families, and to our education system, our future workforce, and our economy,” said Jodi Grant, executive director of the Afterschool Alliance.

The six grant programs under review includes one known as 21st Century Community Learning Centers. It’s the primary federal funding source for afterschool and summer learning programs and supports more than 10,000 local programs nationwide, according to the alliance. Every state runs its own competition to distribute the grants, which totaled $1.3 billion this fiscal year.

Also under review are $2 billion in grants for teachers’ professional development and efforts to reduce class size; $1 billion for academic enrichment grants, often used for science and math education and accelerated learning; $890 million for students who are learning English; $376 million to educate the children of migrant workers; and $715 million to teach adults how to read.

California’s education agency said it was notified Monday that it wouldn’t be receiving money from those programs.

“Trump is illegally impounding billions of dollars appropriated by Congress to serve students this fiscal year,” Tony Thurmond, California’s state superintendent, said in a statement. “The Administration is punishing children when states refuse to cater to Trump’s political ideology.”

The administration had signaled its desire to cut much of the money in an April letter to Sen. Susan Collins, chair of the Senate Committee on Appropriations.

In that letter, Russell Vought, director of the Office of Management and Budget, said cutting money for teaching kids to speak English would help “end overreach from Washington and restore the rightful role of State oversight in education.”

“They’re trying to send a message,” said Amaya Garcia, who oversees education research at New America, a left-leaning think tank. “They don’t believe that taxpayer funding should be used for these children.”

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The Associated Press’ education coverage receives financial support from multiple private foundations. AP is solely responsible for all content. Find AP’s standards for working with philanthropies, a list of supporters and funded coverage areas at AP.org.

Collin Binkley And Bianca Vázquez Toness, The Associated Press

WASHINGTON (AP) — Republicans are getting closer to the finish line in getting their tax and spending cut bill through Congress with a final House vote possible on Wednesday.

At some 887 pages, the legislation is a sprawling collection of tax breaks, spending cuts and other Republican priorities, including new money for national defense and deportations. President Donald Trump has admonished Republicans, who hold majority power in the House and Senate, to skip their holiday vacations and deliver the bill by the Fourth of July.

Democrats are united against the legislation, but are powerless to stop the bill if Republicans are united. The Senate passed the bill, with Vice President JD Vance casting the tie-breaking vote. The House passed an earlier iteration of the bill in May with just one vote to spare. Now, it will take up the Senate-amended measure.

Here’s the latest on what’s in the bill. There could be changes as GOP lawmakers continue to negotiate.

Tax cuts are the priority

Republicans say the bill is crucial because there would be a massive tax increase after December when tax breaks from Trump’s first term expire. The legislation contains about $4.5 trillion in tax cuts.

The existing tax rates and brackets would become permanent under the bill. It temporarily would add new tax breaks that Trump campaigned on: no taxes on tips, overtime pay, the ability to deduct interest payments for some automotive loans, along with a $6,000 deduction for older adults who earn no more than $75,000 a year.

It would boost the $2,000 child tax credit to $2,200. Millions of families at lower income levels would not get the full credit.

A cap on state and local deductions, called SALT, would quadruple to $40,000 for five years. It’s a provision important to New York and other high tax states, though the House wanted it to last for 10 years.

There are scores of business-related tax cuts, including allowing businesses to immediately write off 100% of the cost of equipment and research.

The wealthiest households would see a $12,000 increase from the legislation, which would cost the poorest people $1,600 a year, according to the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office analysis of the House’s version.

Middle-income taxpayers would see a tax break of $500 to $1,500, the CBO said.

Money for deportations, a border wall and the Golden Dome

The bill would provide some $350 billion for Trump’s border and national security agenda, including $46 billion for the U.S.-Mexico border wall and $45 billion for 100,000 migrant detention facility beds, as he aims to fulfill his promise of the largest mass deportation operation in U.S. history.

Money would go for hiring 10,000 new Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers, with $10,000 signing bonuses and a surge of Border Patrol officers, as well. The goal is to deport some 1 million people per year.

The homeland security secretary would have a new $10 billion fund for grants for states that help with federal immigration enforcement and deportation actions.

To help pay for it, immigrants would face various new fees, including when seeking asylum protections.

For the Pentagon, the bill would provide billions for ship building, munitions systems, and quality of life measures for servicemen and women, as well as $25 billion for the development of the Golden Dome missile defense system. The Defense Department would have $1 billion for border security.

How to pay for it? Cuts to Medicaid and other programs

To help partly offset the lost tax revenue and new spending, Republicans aim to cut back on Medicaid and food assistance for the poor.

Republicans argue they are trying to rightsize the safety net programs for the population they were initially designed to serve, mainly pregnant women, the disabled and children, and root out what they describe as waste, fraud and abuse.

The package includes new 80-hour-a-month work requirements for many adults receiving Medicaid and food stamps, including older people up to age 65. Parents of children 14 and older would have to meet the program’s work requirements.

There’s also a proposed new $35 co-payment that can be charged to patients using Medicaid services.

More than 71 million people rely on Medicaid, which expanded under Obama’s Affordable Care Act, and 40 million use the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program. Most already work, according to analysts.

The Congressional Budget Office estimates that 11.8 million more Americans would become uninsured by 2034 if the bill became law and 3 million more would not qualify for food stamps, also known as SNAP benefits.

Republicans are looking to have states pick up some of the cost for SNAP benefits. Currently, the federal government funds all benefit costs. Under the bill, states beginning in 2028 will be required to contribute a set percentage of those costs if their payment error rate exceeds 6%. Payment errors include both underpayments and overpayments.

But the Senate bill temporarily delays the start date of that cost-sharing for states with the highest SNAP error rates. Alaska has the highest error rate in the nation at nearly 25%, according to Department of Agriculture data. Sen. Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska, had fought for the exception. She was a decisive vote in getting the bill through the Senate.

A ‘death sentence’ for clean energy?

Republicans are proposing to dramatically roll back tax breaks designed to boost clean energy projects fueled by renewable sources such as energy and wind. The tax breaks were a central component of President Joe Biden’s 2022 landmark bill focused on addressing climate change and lowering healthcare costs.

Democratic Oregon Sen. Ron Wyden went so far as to call the GOP provisions a “death sentence for America’s wind and solar industries and an inevitable hike in utility bills.”

A tax break for people who buy new or used electric vehicles would expire on Sept. 30 of this year, instead of at the end of 2032 under current law.

Meanwhile, a tax credit for the production of critical materials will be expanded to include metallurgical coal used in steelmaking.

Trump savings accounts and so, so much more

A number of extra provisions reflect other GOP priorities.

The House and Senate both have a new children’s savings program, called Trump Accounts, with a potential $1,000 deposit from the Treasury.

The Senate provided $40 million to establish Trump’s long-sought “National Garden of American Heroes.”

There’s a new excise tax on university endowments. A $200 tax on gun silencers and short-barreled rifles and shotguns was eliminated. One provision bars money to family planning providers, namely Planned Parenthood, while $88 million is earmarked for a pandemic response accountability committee.

Another section expands the Radiation Exposure Compensation Act, a hard-fought provision from GOP Sen. Josh Hawley of Missouri, for those impacted by nuclear development and testing.

Billions would go for the Artemis moon mission and for the exploration of Mars.

Additionally, a provision would increase the nation’s debt limit, by $5 trillion, to allow continued borrowing to pay already accrued bills.

Last-minute changes

The Senate overwhelmingly revolted against a proposal meant to deter states from regulating artificial intelligence. Republican governors across the country asked for the moratorium to be removed and the Senate voted to do so with a resounding 99-1 vote.

A provision was thrown in at the final hours that will provide $10 billion annually to rural hospitals for five years, or $50 billion in total. The Senate bill had originally provided $25 billion for the program, but that number was upped to win over holdout GOP senators and a coalition of House Republicans warning that reduced Medicaid provider taxes would hurt rural hospitals.

The amended bill also stripped out a new tax on wind and solar projects that use a certain percentage of components from China.

What’s the final cost?

Altogether, the Congressional Budget Office projects that the bill would increase federal deficits over the next 10 years by nearly $3.3 trillion from 2025 to 2034.

Or not, depending on how one does the math.

Senate Republicans are proposing a unique strategy of not counting the existing tax breaks as a new cost because those breaks are already “current policy.” Republican senators say the Senate Budget Committee chairman has the authority to set the baseline for the preferred approach.

Under the alternative Senate GOP view, the bill would reduce deficits by almost half a trillion dollars over the coming decade, the CBO said.

Democrats say this is “magic math” that obscures the true costs of the tax breaks. Some nonpartisan groups worried about the country’s fiscal trajectory are siding with Democrats in that regard. The Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget says Senate Republicans are employing an “accounting gimmick that would make Enron executives blush.”

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Kevin Freking And Lisa Mascaro, The Associated Press

WASHINGTON (AP) — The sprawling Republican budget bill approved by the Senate Tuesday removes a proposed tax on solar and wind energy projects but quickly phases out tax credits for wind, solar and other renewable energy.

The Senate approved the bill 51-50 as President Donald Trump and GOP lawmakers move to dismantle the 2022 climate law passed by Democrats under former President Joe Biden. Vice President JD Vance broke a tie after three Republican senators voted no.

The bill now moves to the House for final legislative approval.

The excise tax on solar and wind generation projects was added to the Senate bill over the weekend, prompting bipartisan pushback from lawmakers as well as clean energy developers and advocates.

The final bill removes the tax but mostly sticks with legislative language released late Friday night and would end incentives for clean energy sooner than a draft version unveiled two weeks ago.

Some warn of spike in utility bills

Democrats and environmental groups said the GOP plan would crush growth in the wind and solar industry and lead to a spike in Americans’ utility bills. The measure jeopardizes hundreds of renewable energy projects slated to boost the nation’s electric grid, they said.

“Despite limited improvements, this legislation undermines the very foundation of America’s manufacturing comeback and global energy leadership,” said Abigail Ross Hopper, president and CEO of the Solar Energy Industries Association. If the bill becomes law, “families will face higher electric bills, factories will shut down, Americans will lose their jobs, and our electric grid will grow weaker,” she said.

The American Petroleum Institute, the top lobbying group for the oil and gas industry, applauded the bill’s passage.

“This historic legislation will help usher in a new era of energy dominance by unlocking opportunities for investment, opening lease sales and expanding access to oil and natural gas development,” said Mike Sommers, the group’s president and CEO.

While Democrats complained that the bill would make it harder to get renewable energy to the electric grid, Republicans said the measure represents historic savings for taxpayers and supports production of traditional energy sources such as oil, natural gas and coal, as well as nuclear power, increasing reliability.

In a compromise approved overnight, the bill allows wind and solar projects that begin construction within a year of the law’s enactment to get a full tax credit without a deadline for when the projects are “placed in service,” or plugged into the grid. Wind and solar projects that begin later must be placed in service by the end of 2027 to get a credit.

The bill retains incentives for technologies such as advanced nuclear, geothermal and hydropower through 2032.

Changes to the renewable energy language — including removal of the excise tax on wind and solar — were negotiated by a group of Republican senators, including Alaska Sen. Lisa Murkowski and Iowa Sens. Joni Ernst and Chuck Grassley. Iowa is a top producer of wind power, while Murkowski is a longtime supporter of renewable energy as crucial for achieving energy independence, particularly for isolated rural communities in Alaska.

Murkowski, who voted in favor of the final bill, called her decision-making process “agonizing.”

“I had to look on balance, because the people in my state are the ones that I put first,” she told reporters after Tuesday’s vote. “We do not have a perfect bill by any stretch of the imagination.”

GOP bill said to be ‘massively destructive’

Rhode Island Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse, the top Democrat on the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, called the bill a “massively destructive piece of legislation” that “increases costs for everyone by walloping the health care system, making families go hungry and sending utility bills through the roof.”

The bill “saddles our children and grandchildren with trillions and trillions of dollars in debt — all to serve giant corporations, fossil fuel polluters and billionaire Republican megadonors who are already among the richest people on the planet,” Whitehouse said.

Wyoming Sen. John Barrasso, a Republican and former chairman of the Senate Energy panel, hailed the bill for rescinding many elements of what he called the Biden administration’s “green new scam,” including electric vehicle tax credits that have allowed car owners to lower the purchase price of EVs by $7,500. The bill also blocks a first-ever fee on excess methane emissions from oil and gas production that industry groups fiercely opposed, increases oil and gas leases on public lands and revives coal leasing in Wyoming and other states.

“Today, the Senate moved President Trump’s agenda forward,” said West Virginia Sen. Shelley Moore Capito, a Republican who chairs the Senate environment committee.

Clean energy advocates were deeply disappointed by the bill, which they argue undoes much of the 2022 climate law approved by Democrats.

“By eliminating a number of clean energy incentives and slashing others, this bill represents a significant step backward for America’s energy future,” said Nathaniel Keohane, president of the Center for Climate and Energy Solutions, a nonprofit that seeks to accelerate the global transition to net-zero greenhouse gas emissions.

“Curtailing incentives for electricity generated from wind and solar power is particularly shortsighted” and will raise energy prices for households and businesses and threaten reliability of the electric grid, Keohane said.

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Associated Press writer Alexa St. John in Detroit contributed to this story.

Matthew Daly, The Associated Press

Social media users are falsely claiming that President Donald Trump’s sprawling tax bill, which passed the Senate Tuesday after a turbulent overnight session, will give Trump undue influence over U.S. elections.

“The reason the GOP isn’t concerned about the midterms and why they are pushing this bill is because it gives Trump power to cancel elections,” reads one X post. “If this bill passes — it’s the end of the country. Democracy is over.”

The bill contains no such provision. Here’s a closer look at the facts.

CLAIM: President Donald Trump’s tax bill will allow him to delay or cancel elections.

THE FACTS: That’s false. There is nothing in the legislation that would allow Trump, or any future president, to stop an election from going forward. According to legal experts, a constitutional amendment would have to pass for anyone to have the ability to cancel a federal election. The timing of elections for federal offices is stipulated in federal law and it is highly unlikely that Congress would pass a bill allowing the president to change that timing, experts said.

“Although President Trump might like to cancel or postpone an upcoming election if he thought his party was going to fare poorly, the One Big Beautiful Bill does not actually grant him that power,” said Barry Burden, director of the University of Wisconsin-Madison’s Elections Research Center and a political science professor.

White House spokeswoman Abigail Jackson called the false claims “obviously fake news.”

Burden and other experts agree that these allegations may stem from a misunderstanding of a section of the bill on judicial enforcement that was included in the version passed by the House. That section was removed from the bill after Senate Parliamentarian Elizabeth MacDonough ruled that it violates the so-called Byrd Rule, which essentially bars policy matters in budget reconciliation bills.

Section 70302 could have made it easier for Trump to disregard federal court rulings, requiring parties seeking preliminary injunctions or temporary restraining orders to put down a “security,” such as a cash bond, before the court could issue contempt penalties.

Regardless, such a provision would not allow Trump to delay or cancel elections, even if he tried.

“If Trump announced, I’m canceling the elections, that has as much power as my announcing I’m canceling the elections,” said Justin Levitt, a professor at Loyola Marymount University who specializes in constitutional law and the law of democracy.

Asked whether section 70302 would have given Trump power over whether elections occur, Richard Pildes, a professor of constitutional law at New York University, replied, “Obviously not.”

The U.S. Constitution gives state legislatures the power to set the time of elections, subject to any laws Congress enacts that “make or alter such Regulations.”

Congress set standard federal election dates with a series of laws, starting in 1845. That year, it was determined that states would choose presidential electors “the Tuesday next after the first Monday in the month of November.” Presidential elections have been held every four years on this day since 1848, including through the Civil War, World War I and World War II. Congress aligned House elections with presidential races in 1872 and in 1914 aligned the election of Senators with biennial House elections.

The Constitution states that the term for president and vice president is four years, the term for senators is six years and the term for representatives is two years. Unless they are reelected, there is no mechanism for any of these officials to remain in office after their term ends. Only a constitutional amendment could change this.

Some states have a provision that allows voting in federal races to continue after Election Day in “extraordinary and catastrophic” circumstances, such as a natural disaster. There is no other way to delay a federal election.

Levitt explained that theoretically Congress could pass a law giving the president the power to choose when a federal election happens, but that such a scenario is “extremely unlikely.” ___

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Melissa Goldin, The Associated Press

WASHINGTON (AP) — Senate Republicans hauled President Donald Trump’s big tax breaks and spending cuts bill to passage Tuesday on the narrowest of margins, pushing past opposition from Democrats and their own GOP ranks after a turbulent overnight session.

The sudden outcome capped an unusually tense weekend of work at the Capitol, the president’s signature legislative priority teetering on the edge of approval or collapse. In the end that tally was 50-50, with Vice President JD Vance casting the tie-breaking vote.

Three Republican senators — Thom Tillis of North Carolina, Susan Collins of Maine and Rand Paul of Kentucky — joined all Democrats in voting against it.

“In the end we got the job done,” Senate Majority Leader John Thune of South Dakota said afterward.

The difficulty for Republicans, who have the majority hold in Congress, to wrestle the bill to this point is not expected to let up. The package now goes back to the House, where Speaker Mike Johnson had warned senators not to overhaul what his chamber had already approved. But the Senate did make changes, particularly to Medicaid, risking more problems ahead. House GOP leaders vowed to put it on Trump’s desk by his Fourth of July deadline.

It’s a pivotal moment for the president and his party, as they have been consumed by the 940-page “One Big Beautiful Bill Act,” as it was formally titled before Democrats filed an amendment to strip out the name, and invested their political capital in delivering on the GOP’s sweep of power in Washington.

Trump acknowledged it’s “very complicated stuff,” as he departed the White House for Florida.

“I don’t want to go too crazy with cuts,” he said. “I don’t like cuts.”

What started as a routine but laborious day of amendment voting, in a process called vote-a-rama, spiraled into a round-the-clock slog as Republican leaders were buying time to shore up support.

The droning roll calls in the chamber belied the frenzied action to steady the bill. Grim-faced scenes played out on and off the Senate floor, amid exhaustion.

Thune worked around the clock desperately reaching for last-minute agreements between those in his party worried the bill’s reductions to Medicaid will leave millions more people without care and his most conservative flank, which wants even steeper cuts to hold down deficits ballooning with the tax cuts.

The GOP leaders had no room to spare, with narrow majorities. Thune could lose no more than three Republican senators, and two — Tillis, who warned that millions of people will lose access to Medicaid health care, and Paul, who opposes raising the debt limit by $5 trillion — had already indicated opposition.

Attention quickly turned to two other key senators, Lisa Murkowski of Alaska and Collins, who also raised concerns about health care cuts, as well as a loose coalition of four conservative GOP senators pushing for even steeper reductions.

Murkowski in particular became the subject of the GOP leadership’s attention, as they sat beside her for talks. She was huddled intensely for more than an hour in the back of the chamber with others, scribbling notes on papers.

Then all eyes were on Paul after he returned from a visit to Thune’s office with a stunning offer that could win his vote. He had suggested substantially lowering the bill’s increase in the debt ceiling, according to two people familiar with the private meeting and granted anonymity to discuss it.

Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer of New York said “Republicans are in shambles because they know the bill is so unpopular.”

An analysis from the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office found 11.8 million more Americans would become uninsured by 2034 if the bill became law. The CBO said the package would increase the deficit by nearly $3.3 trillion over the decade.

Pressure built from all sides. Billionaire Elon Musk said those who voted for the package should “hang their head in shame” and warned he would campaign against them. But Trump had also lashed out against the GOP holdouts including Tillis, who abruptly announced his own decision over the weekend not to seek reelection.

Senators insist on changes

Few Republicans appeared fully satisfied as the final package emerged, in either the House or the Senate.

Collins fought to include $50 billion for a new rural hospital fund, among the GOP senators worried that the bill’s Medicaid provider cuts would be devastating and force them to close.

While her amendment for the fund was rejected, the provision was inserted into the final bill. Still she voted no.

The Maine senator said she’s happy the bolstered funding was added, “but my difficulties with the bill go far beyond that.”

And Murkowski called the decision-making process “agonizing.”

She secured provisions to spare Alaska and other states from some food stamp cuts, but her efforts to bolster Medicaid reimbursements fell short. She voted yes.

What’s in the big bill

All told, the Senate bill includes $4.5 trillion in tax cuts, according to the latest CBO analysis, making permanent Trump’s 2017 rates, which would expire at the end of the year if Congress fails to act, while adding the new ones he campaigned on, including no taxes on tips.

The Senate package would roll back billions of dollars in green energy tax credits, which Democrats warn will wipe out wind and solar investments nationwide. It would impose $1.2 trillion in cuts, largely to Medicaid and food stamps, by imposing work requirements on able-bodied people, including some parents and older Americans, making sign-up eligibility more stringent and changing federal reimbursements to states.

Additionally, the bill would provide a $350 billion infusion for border and national security, including for deportations, some of it paid for with new fees charged to immigrants.

“The big not so beautiful bill has passed,” said Paul.

Democrats fighting all day and night

Unable to stop the march toward passage, the Democrats tried to drag out the process, including with a weekend reading of the full bill.

A few of the Democratic amendments won support from a few Republicans, though almost none passed. More were considered in one of the longer such sessions in modern times.

Sen. Patty Murray of Washington, the ranking Democrat on the Appropriations Committee, raised particular concern about the accounting method being used by the Republicans, which says the tax breaks from Trump’s first term are now “current policy” and the cost of extending them should not be counted toward deficits.

She said that kind of “magic math” won’t fly with Americans trying to balance their own household books.

___

Associated Press writers Joey Cappelletti, Darlene Superville, Seung Min Kim and Kevin Freking contributed to this report.

Lisa Mascaro, Mary Clare Jalonick And Matt Brown, The Associated Press

Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine has signed a two-year, $60 billion operating budget that flattens the state’s income tax and sets aside $600 million in unclaimed funds for a new Cleveland Browns stadium.

The Republican governor signed the budget late Monday night, about 45 minutes before the midnight deadline. He also issued 67 line-item vetoes, including one that would have cut funding for homeless shelters “that promote or affirm social gender transition” and another that would have forced public libraries to keep materials on sexual orientation and gender identity away from those under 18.

He also rejected lawmakers’ plan to limit how much money school districts could carry over to 40% and another that would have required candidates for local school board races to be identified with partisan labels on the ballot.

The moves mark the largest number of vetoes DeWine has issued since becoming governor in 2019. His previous record was 44 in 2023. The governor defended his decisions during a news conference Tuesday, noting that state lawmakers can now vote to override the vetoes and put the items back in the budget if they desire.

The budget had been approved by the Republican-controlled state Legislature last week. GOP leaders touted its $1 billion in income tax relief, pathways to address Ohio’s property tax crisis, and that it trims spending at administrative agencies and curtails regulations.

Democrats voted uniformly against the bill, alongside a handful of Republicans, casting it as a collection of misguided policy tradeoffs that prioritize the wealthy over the middle class.

The budget phases in a single flat-tax rate of 2.75% over two years, affecting anyone making over $26,050 annually. Those making less would continue to pay nothing. The plan eliminates the existing 3.5% rate for those making over $100,000 annually by the 2026 tax year.

It also includes the $600 million Haslam Sports Group, owner of the Browns, which requested that the state help build a new domed stadium in suburban Brook Park south of Cleveland. DeWine had proposed doubling taxes on sports betting to help the Browns, as well as the Cincinnati Bengals and other teams who might seek facility upgrades. But the Legislature used some of the $4.8 billion in unclaimed funds the state is holding on to — in small sums, residents left behind from dormant bank accounts, uncashed checks and forgotten utility deposits. Currently, there’s a 10-year time limit before that money reverts to the state.

“This is a win for taxpayers, and it will provide significant money to things that improve the quality of life in Ohio,” DeWine said of the stadium money.

In a statement issued Tuesday, the Browns called the budget approval a “tremendous milestone for our organization” and said DeWine and the Legislature worked together “to find a responsible way to support such a transformative project.”

Lawmakers who represent Cleveland and surrounding communities, mostly Democrats, have blasted the proposal as a gift to the team’s billionaire owners. Democrats outside the Legislature have threatened to sue if DeWine signed the plan, arguing it would be unconstitutionally raiding the unclaimed funds without due process.

Bruce Shipkowski, The Associated Press