Here Are The Worst Things In Trump’s Big, Beautiful Bill

During his meeting with House Republicans on Wednesday, President Donald Trump shared a crucial message: Don’t “fuck around” with Medicaid. But despite their seemingly unwavering loyalty to the president, it seems increasingly likely that GOP representatives will indeed approve a bill that would authorize massive cuts to the program that provides health care for low-income Americans—among other provisions that would slash federal spending while adding trillions to the national debt and financing a substantial windfall for the wealthiest Americans.

The ever-encumbered House Speaker Mike Johnson and his charges are in familiar territory: scrambling to pass the “big, beautiful bill”—which would extend several tax breaks enacted during the first Trump administration—amid the perennial factional infighting for which the GOP caucus has become known. Despite their ostensible desire to reduce the federal debt, the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office found that they may accomplish the opposite of that goal: It estimated that the measure would increase the federal deficit by $2.3 trillion over 10 years, triggering automatic cuts to Medicare absent congressional action. This would be in direct contradiction to Trump’s promises not to touch Medicare, a crucial campaign pledge.

The CBO also found that the bill would increase resources for the top 10 percent of Americans and lower incomes for the bottom 10 percent. The measure would slash nearly $1 trillion from Medicaid and the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, formerly known as food stamps. The CBO estimated that the loss in resources would be due to the cuts to Medicaid and SNAP, while the wealthiest 10 percent would see an increase in income “mainly because of reductions in the taxes they owe.” Moreover, as many as 7.6 million Americans would be uninsured by 2034 because of the cuts to Medicaid.

The CBO’s findings were echoed by researchers at the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School of Business last Friday, whose budget model revealed that those in the lowest income quintile (annual income of $17,000 or less) would see their after-tax income cut by $1,035. Meanwhile, those in the top 0.1 percent of earners would take home an additional $389,280.

“This is what Republicans are fighting for—lining the pockets of their billionaire donors while children go hungry and families get kicked off their health care,” said Representative Brendan Boyle, the ranking member of the House Budget Committee, in a statement. House Speaker Mike Johnson has struggled to usher the bill through the lower chamber, partially due to moderate Republicans’ desire to lift a cap on the state and local tax reduction, but also because some hard-line conservatives want to cut the social safety net by an even greater amount.

Republicans argue that by tightening Medicaid and SNAP work requirements for able-bodied adults without dependents, they will be reducing the amount of fraud in the program—but evidence suggests that work requirements are more likely to result in people losing coverage without a corresponding meaningful boost in employment. A new report by the Urban Institute found that the work requirements included in the House bill would lead to 5.4 million people losing all or most of their SNAP benefits. The bill would also shift a significant percentage of the cost of SNAP to the states, which would put a strain on state budgets and likely result in losses in benefits.

Despite a proposed increase in the child tax credit, the bill would also exclude millions of children, according to a report by the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, in part because of a provision that requires both parents to have Social Security numbers—an attempt to prevent the children of undocumented immigrants from receiving the benefits.

“Whatever Republican policymakers may think, these policies aren’t popular with the public because they aren’t consistent with core American values, which include helping people when they fall on tough times and expecting wealthy people to pay their fair share,” Sharon Parrott, the president of the left-leaning CBPP, said in a statement.

Even if the House bill is approved, it is likely to be changed in the Senate, where even some Republicans have expressed concerns about the proposed cuts to Medicaid. In an op-ed in The New York Times earlier this month, GOP Senator Josh Hawley condemned the “corporatist Republicans” who want to “build our big, beautiful bill around slashing health insurance for the working poor.”

“That argument is both morally wrong and politically suicidal,” Hawley wrote.

Moreover, the House has yet to approve the bill given the recalcitrance of conservative Republicans, despite the Trump administration’s pressure. Until it passes either chamber of Congress, the potential effects of the bill remain theoretical—much to the Trump administration’s chagrin.

“The House of Representatives should immediately pass this bill to show the American people that they are serious about ‘promises made, promises kept.’ President Trump is committed to keeping his promises, and failure to pass this bill would be the ultimate betrayal,” the White House said in a statement Wednesday.