Senate Republican : ‘I would retire, too, if I voted against’ GOP megabill

Sen. Jim Banks (R-Ind.) took aim at Sen. Thom Tillis on Monday after the North Carolina Republican announced he would not run for reelection in the wake of coming out against President Trump’s “big, beautiful bill.”

“I would retire, too, if I voted against this bill, because everyone in Indiana is counting on it. Tillis voted against it anyway, so that’s a moot point,” Banks said during a “Fox & Friends” appearance.

Tillis was one of two Republicans to vote against advancing the bill on Saturday, and he vowed to vote against final passage as well over concerns about the impact Medicaid cuts would have on North Carolina.

Tillis announced Sunday that he would not run again, opening up a closely contested seat that the Democrats have attempted to flip for years.

Tillis’s opposition to the bill earned him the ire of the president, with Trump suggesting that he would back a primary challenge against the two-term lawmaker. And Banks pushed back on Tillis’s concerns about the megabill’s cuts to Medicaid in another “Fox & Friends” appearance Sunday.

In his Monday “Fox & Friends” appearance, Banks maintained the GOP line that the bill would create significant tax cuts that would benefit working families.

“This bill is so good and so strong. It’s a commonsense vote,” Banks said. 

After a long weekend of negotiations that included a Democratic move to force the chamber’s clerks to read all 940 pages of the bill out loud, Senate Republicans are grinding toward a final vote. Senators are currently in a “vote-a-rama,” where they can propose unlimited amendments to the legislation.

While Banks took aim at Tillis, other GOP senators reacted more warmly to the lawmaker’s exit.

Sen. Mitch McConnell (Ky.), the former Republican leader, wrote Monday morning that Tillis was “one of the most effective and collegial members that I have ever served with in the United States Senate.”

“His announcement is a big setback for the Senate and the Republican Conference,” McConnell wrote.