US senators have begun debating Donald Trump's “big and beautiful” spending bill, which is highly controversial and will implement key parts of the US president's domestic agenda while imposing massive cuts to social programs, AFP reported.

Trump hopes to cement his legacy with a “big, beautiful bill” that would extend expiring tax cuts from his first term worth $4.5 trillion and strengthen border security.

Republicans, who have their eyes on the 2026 midterm elections, are divided over the package, which would strip millions of the poorest Americans of health insurance and add more than $3 trillion to the national debt.

The Senate officially opened debate on the bill after Republican opponents delayed a procedural vote that was supposed to take place, drawing Trump's ire on social media.

Senators narrowly approved the motion to begin debate by a vote of 51 to 49, hours after the vote was called and Vice President JD Vance joined negotiations with opponents from his own party.

In the end, two Republican senators joined 47 Democrats and voted against starting the debate.

Trump is pushing his party to pass the bill so he can sign it into law by July 4, Independence Day in the United States.

Democrats are strongly opposed to the bill and Trump's agenda and have vowed to block the debate. They began by insisting that the entire bill be read aloud in the chamber before the debate began.

The bill is about 1,000 pages long and is expected to take about 15 hours to read.

“Republicans don't want to tell America what's in the bill,” said Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumer. “That's why Democrats are insisting that it be read from cover to cover on the floor. We will stay here all night if necessary to read it.”

If passed by the Senate, the bill will return to the House of Representatives for approval, where Republicans can afford to lose only a few votes — and face fierce opposition from within their own ranks.

Divisive cuts

Republicans are struggling to offset the $4.5 trillion cost of Trump's tax cuts, with many of the proposed cuts coming from cuts to Medicaid, the health insurance program for low-income Americans.

Republicans are divided over Medicaid cuts that would threaten dozens of rural hospitals and leave about 8.6 million Americans without health care.

The spending plan would also repeal many of the renewable energy tax breaks introduced by Trump's predecessor, Joe Biden.

Trump's key ally, Elon Musk, with whom the president publicly quarreled this month over his criticism of the bill, called the current proposal “completely insane and destructive.”

“It gives aid to industries of the past while seriously damaging the industries of the future,” said Musk, who is the richest man in the world and owns, among other things, electric car company Tesla and space company SpaceX.

Independent analyses also show that the bill would pave the way for a historic redistribution of wealth from the poorest 10% of Americans to the richest.

According to extensive recent surveys, the bill is unpopular among various demographic, age, and income groups.

Although the House of Representatives has already passed its version, both chambers must agree on the same text before it can be signed into law. |BGNES