Republican Senate tax bill would add $3.3 trillion to the US debt load, CBO says

WASHINGTON (AP) — The changes made to President Donald Trump's big tax bill in the Senate would pile trillions onto the nation's debt load while resulting in even steeper losses in health care coverage, the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office said in a new analysis, adding to the challenges for Republicans as they try to muscle the bill to passage.

The CBO estimates the Senate bill would increase the deficit by nearly $3.3 trillion from 2025 to 2034, a nearly $1 trillion increase over the House-passed bill, which CBO has projected would add $2.4 to the debt over a decade.

The analysis also found that 11.8 million more Americans would become uninsured by 2034 if the bill became law, an increase over the scoring for the House-passed version of the bill, which predicts 10.9 million more people would be without health coverage.

The stark numbers are yet another obstacle for Republican leaders as they labor to pass Trump's bill by his self-imposed July 4th deadline.

Even before the CBO's estimate, Republicans were at odds over the contours of the legislation, with some resisting the cost-saving proposals to reduce spending on Medicaid and food aid programs even as other Republicans say those proposals don't go far enough. Republicans are slashing the programs as a way to help cover the cost of extending some $3.8 trillion in Trump tax breaks put in place during his first term.

The push-pull was on vivid display Saturday night as a routine procedural vote to take up the legislation in the Senate was held open for hours as Vice President JD Vance and Republican leaders met with several holdouts. The bill ultimately advanced in a 51-49 vote, but the path ahead is fraught, with voting on amendments still to come.

Still, many Republicans are disputing the CBO estimates and the reliability of the office's work. To hoist the bill to passage, they are using a different budget baseline that assumes the Trump tax cuts expiring in December have already been extended, essentially making them cost-free in the budget.

The CBO on Saturday released a separate analysis of the GOP's preferred approach that found the Senate bill would reduce deficits by about $500 billion.

Democrats and economists decry the GOP's approach as “magic math” that obscures the true costs of the GOP tax breaks.

In addition, Democrats note that under the traditional scoring system, the Republican bill bill would violate the Senate's “Byrd Rule” that forbids the legislation from increasing deficits after 10 years.

In a Sunday letter to Oregon Sen. Jeff Merkley, the top Democrat on the Senate Budget Committee, CBO Director Phillip Swagel said the office estimates that the Finance Committee’s portion of the bill, also known as Title VII, “increases the deficits in years after 2034” under traditional scoring.

The ornate corridor outside the Senate chamber is seen as Senate Republicans work to pass President Donald Trump's bill of tax breaks and spending cuts by his July Fourth deadline, in Washington, Sunday, June 29, 2025. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite)

President Donald Trump answers questions from reporters as he meets with Congo's Foreign Minister Therese Kayikwamba Wagner, and Rwanda's Foreign Minister Olivier Nduhungirehe, Friday, June 27, 2025, in the Oval Office at the White House in Washington. (AP Photo/Manuel Balce Ceneta)

Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., joined at left by Sen. John Barrasso, R-Wyo., the GOP whip, speaks to reporters following closed-door party meetings at the Capitol in Washington, Tuesday, June 17, 2025. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite)

SEOUL, South Korea (AP) — An independent counsel on Tuesday demanded a death sentence for former South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol on rebellion charges in connection with his short-lived imposition of martial law in December 2024.

Removed from office last April, Yoon faces eight trials over various criminal charges related to his martial law debacle and other scandals related to his time in office. Charges that he directed a rebellion are the most significant ones.

Independent counsel Cho Eun-suk’s team requested the Seoul Central District Court to sentence Yoon to death, according to the court.

The Seoul court is expected to deliver a verdict on Yoon in February. Experts say the court likely will sentence him to life in prison. South Korea hasn't executed anyone since 1997.

Yoon was scheduled to make remarks at Tuesday's hearing. He has maintained that his decree was a desperate yet peaceful attempt to raise public awareness about what he considered the danger of the liberal opposition Democratic Party, which used its legislative majority to obstruct his agenda. He called the opposition-controlled parliament “a den of criminals” and “anti-state forces.”

Yoon’s decree, the first of its kind in more than 40 years in South Korea, brought armed troops into Seoul streets to encircle the assembly and enter election offices. That evoked traumatic memories of dictatorships in the 1970s and 1980s, when military-backed rulers used martial law and other emergency decrees to station soldiers and armored vehicles in public places to suppress pro-democracy protests.

On the night of Yoon's martial law declaration, thousands of people rushed to the National Assembly to object to the decree and demand his resignation in dramatic scenes. Enough lawmakers, including even those in Yoon’s ruling party, managed to enter an assembly hall to vote down the decree.

Observers described Yoon’s action as political suicide. Parliament impeached him and sent the case to the Constitutional Court, which ruled to dismiss him as president.

It was a spectacular downfall for Yoon, a former star prosecutor who won South Korea’s presidency in 2022, a year after entering politics.

Lee Jae Myung, a former Democratic Party leader who led Yoon's impeachment bid, became president by winning a snap election last June. After taking office, Lee appointed three independent counsels to delve into allegations involving Yoon, his wife and associates.

There had been speculation that Yoon resorted to martial law to protect his wife, Kim Keon Hee, from potential corruption investigations. But in wrapping up a six-month investigation last month, independent counsel Cho’s team concluded that Yoon plotted for over a year to impose martial law to eliminate his political rivals and monopolize power.

Yoon’s decree and ensuing power vacuum plunged South Korea into political turmoil, halted the country’s high-level diplomacy and rattled its financial markets.

Yoon’s earlier vows to fight attempts to impeach and arrest him deepened the country’s political divide. In January last year, he became the country’s first sitting president to be detained.

Supporters of former South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol hold signs outside of Seoul Central District Court, in Seoul, South Korea, Tuesday, Jan. 13, 2026. (AP Photo/Lee Jin-man)

FILE - Then South Korea's ousted former President Yoon Suk Yeol who is facing charges of orchestrating a rebellion when he declared martial law on Dec. 3, arrives to attend his trial at the Seoul Central District Court in Seoul, South Korea, Monday, May 12, 2025. (AP Photo/Ahn Young-joon, Pool, File)