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President Donald Trump said on Wednesday that he plans to negotiate aspects of his “big, beautiful” tax bill, expressing dissatisfaction with certain provisions while being satisfied with others.
It comes after billionaire Elon Musk’s criticism a day earlier, in which he argued the bill detracted from efforts to reduce the US budget deficit.
Trump and his fellow Republicans had previously dubbed their tax and spending legislation a “big, beautiful bill”.
What is Trump’s tax bill?
On 22 May, the US House of Representatives passed the sweeping tax and spending bill that would enact much of Trump’s policy agenda. It would also leave the country with trillions of dollars more in debt.
The bill, which was passed by a single vote, will add about $3.8 trillion to the federal government’s $36.2 trillion in debt over the next decade, according to the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office.
The US Senate is now considering the measure.
What did Elon Musk say?
In an interview with CBS, Musk said he was “disappointed to see the massive spending bill” because it increases the budget deficit and undermines the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE).
“I think a bill can be big or it can be beautiful. But I don’t know if it can be both,” Musk said in the interview.
The White House intends to send Congress a small package as early as next week to formalise cuts made by Musk’s team targeting federal government spending, a White House official familiar with the plan said on Wednesday.
How has Trump responded?
Trump later expressed dissatisfaction with some provisions of the bill.
“We will be negotiating that bill, and I’m not happy about certain aspects of it, but I’m thrilled by other aspects of it,” Trump told reporters, without directly addressing Musk’s concerns.
He also emphasised the need to secure sufficient support for the bill’s passage in the Senate, stating, “We can’t be cutting, you know, we need to get a lot of support.”
