Trial of strength in the Senate – Trump’s tax gift is at risk of collapsing within his own party

It is Saturday evening in Washington, and the Senate is still lit. No ceremonial act, no state visit - but a political ballet of nerves where every vote counts. While President Donald Trump is taking selfies with loyal senators on his golf course in Virginia, his own camp is wrestling in the Capitol with a legislative monster: 940 pages full of tax breaks, social cuts, and billions for the deportation apparatus. A package meant to recalibrate America's internal order - and threatening to collapse under the contradictions of his own party.

Because although the Republicans govern with a narrow majority, there is anything but unity. Several senators are openly refusing to follow, the debate is stalling, and eventually Vice President JD Vance has to appear in person to break a looming tie. Meanwhile, negotiations are underway behind closed doors, the CBO warns of $2.4 trillion in new debt and over ten million people who would lose their health insurance - and outside, in front of the cameras, Trump remains silent. Or smiles. Or threatens. “It’s time to get this legislation across the finish line,” said Majority Leader John Thune still optimistically - but the reality looks different. It is a tough struggle between political dogmas, personal calculation, and a president who insists on maximum loyalty. Those who don’t fall in line are publicly shamed. Those who hesitate are labeled traitors. This time, the opponents don’t just come from the Democratic side. Senator Thom Tillis - Republican from North Carolina - declared openly that he could not support the bill. The Medicaid cuts, he said, would force his state into “hundreds of thousands of painful decisions.” Senator Rand Paul also refuses his support - not out of compassion, but on principle: raising the debt ceiling by five trillion dollars, he says, would be political suicide.

Meanwhile, of all people, Elon Musk speaks out. The man who was once the technocratic poster boy of the MAGA era now calls Trump’s bill “insane” and “strategically destructive.” It would, according to Musk, “destroy millions of jobs.” A sentence that weighs heavier than some convention speeches - and shows how cracked the Republican foundation has become. That this law is to be rammed through without the public even having a day to understand it is part of the strategy. The final draft was published only late Friday night - and already on Saturday the Capitol was under pressure. The Democrats speak of a “legislative blitz operation,” Schumer demands a full reading of the bill in the Senate. Symbolic, yes - but also a desperate attempt to hold their breath for as long as possible. Because what’s up for vote here is not merely a tax reform. It is a political Gesamtkunstwerk of deterrence, privilege, and state-imposed inequality. The wealthy benefit with an average of $12,000, the poorest lose $1,600. Green energy is slashed, deportation expanded. And anyone who thinks this is just about numbers has never understood Trump’s agenda: It’s about identity. About dominance. About a reordering of the social contract according to the principle: Those who stay, pay. Those who disrupt, go. Even with the so-called SALT deductions - a technocratic tax detail that until now only interested tax advisors and lawmakers from New York - the compromise threatens to collapse. Raising the deduction cap to $40,000 - a concession to Republicans from high-tax states - is criticized by others as “too generous.” The rift runs through factions, through states, through families. And above it all, the clock is ticking. Trump wants the victory by Independence Day. A bill meant to cement his version of America for decades to come - if necessary, against the resistance of his own people. But it’s still unclear whether the pact will hold. Still unclear whether the paper on which these tax dreams are printed will even be dry by July 4. What remains is an image: The president in golf attire. The vice president on the way to the vote. And a Senate winding its way through the night - between loyalty, fear, and the dull sense that this bill will change not just numbers, but the very character of the United States.