Republicans’ $9.4 billion rescissions bill is struggling to get through the Senate after barely surviving the first round of procedural votes.
The House-passed Rescissions Act of 2025 requests the cancellation of already approved federal spending deemed wasteful by the Trump administration. That includes $8.3 billion in non-lifesaving foreign aid and $1.1 billion meant to fund the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, which finances NPR, PBS and some radio stations.
While the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) assured lawmakers the rescissions will only defund “woke” foreign aid programs and “politically biased” public broadcasting systems like PBS and NPR, some Republican senators worried about the bill’s impacts on the global HIV/AIDS prevention program PEPFAR or rural radio stations around the nation.
Vice President J.D. Vance had to cast the tie-breaking vote to advance the bill Tuesday night when Sens. Mitch McConnell, R-Ky.; Susan Collins, R-Maine; and Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska; joined all Democrats in opposing it.
“The rescissions package has a big problem – nobody really knows what program reductions are in it,” Collins stated following her Tuesday “no” vote. “The sparse text that was sent to Congress included very little detail and does not give an accounting of the specific program cuts that would total $9.4 billion.”
Republican Senate leaders are hoping to flip the vote of Collins and others by passing an amendment during the vote-a-rama – still ongoing as of early evening Wednesday – that would salvage $400 million for PEPFAR funding, lowering rescissions package savings to $9 billion.
Among other projects, the bill claws back $3 million for circumcision, vasectomies and condoms in Zambia; $6 million for “Net Zero Cities” in Mexico; and $5 million to strengthen the “resilience of lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, intersex, and queer global movements.”
Other initiatives OMB says will lose funds include “Green New Deal-style” energy and climate projects in third world countries – such as electric buses for Rwanda – and “woke” global aid programs promoting everything from abortion pills and vegan foods to DEI awareness and LGBTQ activism.
Conservative groups have urged lawmakers to support the package as a small step towards tackling the federal deficit. However, Democrats have threatened to later force a government shutdown if the bill makes it to the president’s desk, a warning most Republicans aren’t taking seriously.
“If Dems want to threaten a shut down over cutting ‘gender diversity in the Mexican street lighting industry’… they can explain that to their voters,” Sen. Markwayne Mullin, R-Okla., quipped on X.
Whatever changes the Senate makes to the bill Wednesday night must also receive approval from the House. Congress must have the legislation ready for President Donald Trump’s signature by Friday, or else the $9.4 billion must be spent as appropriated.
