Senate votes on scores of amendments to Trump's domestic spending bill

Senators offered more than a dozen amendments Monday to President Donald Trump's megabill, following a weekend of tense negotiations on Capitol Hill to try to get the president's second-term domestic priorities through the upper chamber.

The process, called a "vote-a-rama," began shortly after 9 a.m. ET and continued well after markets closed, with lawmakers continuing to slog through votes on amendments to the bill.

A final vote on the package, which Senate Majority Leader John Thune has indicated he hopes happens as soon as Monday evening or Tuesday, cannot occur until the vote-a-rama concludes.

Republicans relied on their narrow majority to stave off repeated attempts from Democrats to tweak the bill through amendments.

While votes on amendments fell largely along party lines, some Democratic-led amendments did garner Republican support.

Sen. Ed Markey, Mass., for instance, introduced a change to the bill that sought to remove any language that would "force rural hospitals to limit their services or actually close their doors" due to cuts to Medicaid or Medicare, Markey said on the Senate floor.

Two Republicans, Sens. Susan Collins of Maine and Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, crossed the aisle and voted with Democrats in favor of the amendment. Even so, that only added up to 49 yay votes, versus 51 nays from the rest of the GOP conference, meaning the amendment failed.

Later in the day, four Democratic senators representing swing states — Sens. Jon Ossoff and Raphael Warnock of Georgia, Catherine Cortez Masto of Nevada and Maggie Hassan of New Hampshire — voted with Republicans on an amendment introduced by Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas).

The amendment, which ultimately failed because it required 60 votes to pass, would have cut Medicaid funding for states that provide benefits to undocumented immigrants charged with certain crimes.

Senators are allowed to introduce unlimited amendments to the budget bill, forcing the chamber to cast back-to-back votes.

Most amendments didn't win the necessary votes to get into the bill. But that's not always the point. For many, the purpose is to send a political message, or to highlight various senators' opposition to, or support for, different pieces of the massive package.

For example, Democrats have tried to force Republicans to cast votes in favor of some of the more controversial parts of the bill, like Medicaid work requirements and the end of tax credits for electric vehicles.

Not only do these votes make individual Republicans squirm, but they can be used for attack ads when a senator is up for reelection.

Republicans, meanwhile, are using the amendment process in part to log their personal opposition to specific parts of the bill, even though they ultimately plan to vote in favor of its passage.

The marathon day of voting in the upper chamber comes as the White House continues to emphasize that they want lawmakers to get the bill on Trump's desk by July 4.

"We need the full weight of the Republican conference to get behind this bill and we expect them to, and we are confident that they will," White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said Monday at a briefing for reporters.

Trump is also regularly talking with House Speaker Mike Johnson and Thune over phone about the bill, a White House official told CNBC.

Leavitt had said that Trump had met with the two GOP leaders at the White House on Monday, but spokespeople for both lawmakers refuted that account.

"Teams are obviously in close contact/coordination, as always, but we're continuing to move through vote-a-rama in the Senate," a spokesman for Thune wrote on social media.

Lawmakers worked through the weekend to try to get Trump's bill across the finish line as Republicans' self-imposed July 4 deadline looms.

Republicans eked out a key procedural win late Saturday, with just two GOP senators — Thom Tillis of North Carolina and Rand Paul of Kentucky — voting against a motion to advance the bill.

But Thune is presiding over an extremely narrow majority, so he can only afford to lose one more vote in the final ballot — in addition to Tillis and Paul — and still pass the package.

Sen. Ron Johnson, R-Wis., an outspoken critic of the bill, signaled Monday that he is not committed to backing the package, in a sign of possible trouble for Thune.

Johnson ultimately voted to advance the bill during the Saturday procedural vote, but that was only after he switched his vote at the 11th hour.

Even if Thune is able to get the bill through his chamber, it faces an uncertain path in the House, where lawmakers must approve the revisions made by the upper chamber.

Some House Republicans have already signaled objections to changes in the Senate version of the "big, beautiful bill."

House Republican leadership, for its part, has told its members to prepare for votes on the package Tuesday or Wednesday, Politico reports.

This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.