Democratic Rep. Ilhan Omar called the Republican budget package “one of
the most cruel, immoral pieces of legislation that Congress has ever
voted on.”
People take part in a protest against the Republican tax bill in Los
Angeles, California on December 4, 2017.Photo by Ronen Tivony/NurPhoto
via Getty Images
House Republicans on Thursday put
the final stamp of approval on budget legislation that will inflict devastating
cuts on Medicaid, federal nutrition assistance, clean energy initiatives, and
other programs to help finance another round of tax breaks for the rich—an
unparalleled upward transfer of wealth that’s expected to have cascading
effects across the United States for years to come.
The sprawling legislation passed
in a mostly party-line vote, with just two House Republicans—Reps. Brian
Fitzpatrick (R-Pa.) and Thomas Massie (R-Ky.)—joining every Democrat in
opposition to the bill, which now heads to President Donald Trump’s desk.
Following the 218-214 vote, Rep.
Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.) called the reconciliation package “one of the most cruel,
immoral pieces of legislation that Congress has ever voted on.”
“Not only did this bill get worse
from the last time the House voted on it, it will be remembered as one of the
most catastrophic bills passed in modern history,” said Omar.
The following is a sample of
reactions from lawmakers and advocacy groups decrying the legislation’s attacks
on healthcare, the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, reproductive
rights, the climate, and more.
April Verrett, president of SEIU:
What the Republicans just did.
It’s outrageous, it’s despicable, it’s immoral, itss anti-American. But SEIU
members won’t forget. We will never forget that children will go hungry because
of what they’ve done.
We will never forget that people
will suffer because of what they’ve done. And why? For the biggest steal of
taxpayer money, of working people’s money – not just poor people, but senior
citizens. Every American will feel the repercussions of this horrible bill, but
we won’t forget and we will get our just due.
Joseph Geevarghese, executive
director of Our Revolution:
“Republicans
have passed the most dangerous legislation of our lifetimes. This bill hands
billionaires and corporations a trillion-dollar tax break, paid for by ripping
health care from 17 million people, gutting funding for rural hospitals,
slashing clean energy investments, and cutting food assistance for millions of
children.
“This
reckless sellout to the billionaire class will trigger the largest transfer of
wealth from working- and middle-class Americans to the ultra-wealthy in our
nation’s history. This isn’t just bad policy — it’s a moral failure that will
cost an untold number of lives. Every lawmaker who voted for this shameful
legislation must be held accountable at the ballot box.”
Robert Weissman, co-president of
Public Citizen:
“Trump
and Congressional Republicans have certainly delivered for the billionaire
class.
“There
are 800 billionaires in the United States and 12 100-billionaires. They don’t
need any financial help. But that’s precisely what Trump and Congressional
Republicans have done, with a monstrosity of a bill that may constitute the
single biggest upward transfer of wealth in American history.”
Amy Hanauer, executive director
of the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy:
This
abominable bill will make history—in appalling ways. Never before has
legislation taken so much from struggling families to give so much to the
richest. It makes the biggest cuts to food aid for hungry families, executes
the largest cuts to health care ever, adds trillions to the national debt – all
to give $117 billion to the richest 1 percent in a single year. It’s no wonder
that this bill is also extremely unpopular. Historians – and voters – will look
back at this as a dark day in U.S. history.
David Kass, executive director of
Americans for Tax Fairness:
This
bill represents a massive transfer of wealth from the working class to the top
1%. It enacts the largest Medicaid and SNAP cuts in history while adding over
$3 trillion to the national debt. Furthermore it makes the tax code more
complex with new special interest tax breaks and handouts to the ultra wealthy.
In the coming years, Democrats must prioritize repealing and replacing these
disastrous policies to protect American families from rising costs and loss of
healthcare coverage. We need to create a truly fair tax system and an economy
that works for all Americans, not just the wealthy few.
Bishop William Barber, co-founder
Repairers of the Breach:
Today,
Congress passed one of the most morally-bankrupt pieces of legislation in our
nation’s history. This big ugly bill is the largest cut to healthcare and food
assistance for children in our nation’s history, and it funds a war on
immigrant communities. All the while, the bill gives tax breaks to the
wealthiest among us—on the backs of our most vulnerable neighbors.
By
passing this bill, lawmakers have officially codified the deaths of thousands
of people. It’s policy murder in plain sight.”
Many of the people who passed this bill also
consistently profess to be led by religious values. There is no religion that
supports the degradation of humans. Policymakers can’t just claim their
religious values in one breath, and then turn around and approve legislation
that’s guaranteed to kill people.
The
passage of this bill is deadly, but it is not a defeat. We must meet it with a
resurrection. We will organize voters in every impacted community to push
legislators who voted for this bill out of office and build a movement together
that can reconstruct our democracy.
Americans for Tax Fairness:
Today,
President Trump and his billionaire-backed Republican-controlled Congress
successfully passed their reconciliation bill, passing the largest cuts in
Medicaid and SNAP history while slashing billions from other essential programs
to fund massive tax giveaways for billionaires and large corporations. The bill
will raise average Americans’ costs by causing 17 million Americans to lose
their health insurance and 2 million to lose access to food assistance.
Throughout the opaque legislative process, the Republican majority in both
houses didn’t hold a single hearing on their legislative proposals, and forced
their members to vote under the cover of night and during weekend sessions,
reflecting the GOP majority’s pattern of minimizing public attention to a
wildly unpopular legislative package.Richard Fiesta, executive director of the
Alliance for Retired Americans:
Today,
the House turned its back on the very people they were elected to serve. This
bill isn’t about lowering prices or helping everyday Americans — it’s about
lining the pockets of billionaires and big corporations while ripping away
essential health care and support from seniors, people with disabilities, and
working families.
Congressional
Republicans have just voted for tax giveaways for the wealthy while throwing
millions of people off of Medicaid, slashing half a trillion dollars from
Medicare, and driving hundreds of nursing homes and local hospitals into
crisis. All of this will make it harder for older Americans to get the health
care they need at a price they can afford.
To
add insult to injury, this bill hastens the depletion of the Social Security
Trust Fund’s reserves by one year. It’s a slap in the face to every family who
paid into Social Security and Medicare over a lifetime of work.
We
will not forget how our representatives voted today. We will make sure every
older American knows what is in this legislation — and who to hold accountable
for this debacle.
Tony Carrk, executive director of
Accountable.US:
Today’s
party-line vote by House Republicans to rip healthcare away and raise grocery
costs for tens of millions of Americans is as devastating as it is enraging.
For months, a decisive number of House Republicans voiced their concerns,
acknowledging that this bill would make people poorer and sicker, only to vote
in favor of this bill. It’s a cruel betrayal and proof positive you cannot
trust career politicians who will put their interests over those of their own
constituents’ health care and wallets.
Bobby Mukkamala, M.D., president
of the American Medical Association (AMA):
Today
is a sad and unnecessarily harmful day for patients and health care across the
country, and its impact will reverberate for years. Care will be less
accessible, and patients may simply forego seeing their physician because the
lifelines of Medicaid and CHIP are severed.
This
is bad for my patients in Flint, Michigan, and it is devastating for the
estimated 11.8 million people who will have no health insurance coverage as a
result of this bill.
The
American Medical Association’s mission is promoting the art and science of
medicine and the betterment of public health. This bill moves us in the wrong
direction. It will make it harder to access care and make patients sicker. It
will make it more likely that acute, treatable illnesses will turn into
life-threatening or costly chronic conditions. That is disappointing,
maddening, and unacceptable.
Max Richtman, president & CEO
of the National Committee to Preserve Social Security and Medicare:
In enacting President Trump’s ‘Unfair, Ugly
Bill,’ House Republicans have voted to rip health coverage away from as many as
16 million Americans and food assistance from millions more. Make no mistake,
the deepest cuts in history to Medicaid and SNAP will devastate older Americans
who depend on both programs for health coverage, long-term care, and nutrition.
7.2 million seniors are dually enrolled in Medicare and Medicaid; 6.5 million
rely on SNAP benefits to stay healthy and make ends meet. The bill could even
trigger automatic cuts to Medicare down the road.
These
beneficiaries are some of the most vulnerable members of our society — and
Republicans have put them at risk in order to pay for another tax cut mainly
for the rich. Republicans have passed this mean-spirited legislation with
little regard for public opinion or well-being. Recent polling suggests that
Americans who know about the bill are against it 2 to 1. No matter. Republicans
are enacting a craven agenda to shower their wealthy donors with tax cuts at
the expense of seniors and lower-income Americans.
This
bill has rightly been called ‘downright regressive and cruel’ — and ‘the
largest transfer of wealth from the poor to the rich in U.S. history.’
President Trump was planning to sign the bill on July 4th. We can’t think of
anything LESS patriotic than depriving millions of Americans of health coverage
to further enrich the already wealthy. This is not responsible leadership. It’s
just the opposite. Make no mistake: older Americans and their advocates WILL
NOT FORGET. Republicans will be held accountable — now and during the 2026
elections. If our response were boiled down to one word, it simply would be
SHAME!
National Nurses United:
This
is among the darkest days in the history of U.S. health care. People will
suffer and die because of the cuts in this legislation to fund tax cuts for
billionaires — certainly in the short term and potentially for decades to come
if nothing is done. The policy goal here is clear: Take away everyday people’s
health care coverage. Every politician who supports this legislation has blood
on their hands and only themselves to blame when the impacts of these cuts
devastate a health care system already in a near-constant state of crisis.
These cuts will hurt these lawmakers’ constituents, our patients, who are
already dealing with a broken health care system.
Lawmakers
have effectively signed the death warrants for millions today. It will steal
money from safety-net community hospitals and reproductive health care clinics,
like Planned Parenthood. It will kick people off their health insurance. It
will effectively punish people for getting sick or injured, making us all
sicker and less healthy.
While
we will only understand the larger impacts of this law as they unfold, experts
have made clear that the potential is devastating: Millions will lose insurance
coverage, and hundreds of hospitals will see critical hits to their funding.
Meanwhile, the rich will get richer.
Beth Lowell, Oceana vice
president for the United States:
“Thriving
and abundant oceans should not be bargaining chips at the Congressional table.
This big, terrible bill is the worst environmental legislation in American
history, unraveling safeguards and investments that Americans — and coastal
economies — rely on and need. This disastrous bill would require the largest
expansion of offshore oil and gas lease sales by area ever in the United
States. We should be protecting our coasts and oceans, not opening the
floodgates to more offshore drilling and increasing the risk of dangerous oil
spills.”
Manish Bapna, president of NRDC
(Natural Resources Defense Council):
Every
lawmaker who voted for this cynical measure chose tax cuts for the wealthiest
over Americans’ health, pocketbooks, public lands and waters — and a safe
climate. They should be ashamed.
This
measure gives the wealthiest a tax break while the rest of us will pay more on
our electric bills and at the pump. So much for President Trump’s promise to
save Americans money on their energy bills.
This
Trump energy tax will cost electricity customers billions of dollars in higher
bills. Drivers will need to fill up more often at the pump. And costs for
things like cleaner cars, solar energy and efficient air conditioners will
skyrocket.
We
urgently need more clean, affordable energy, but this measure would bring the
renaissance in American clean energy production to a halt and send good,
domestic manufacturing jobs to our foreign rivals.
Oil
executives, industrial loggers and coal CEOs can all celebrate today as they
gain unprecedented access to drill, log and mine on our public lands. The rest
of us will soon find no trespassing signs on lands that have belonged to all of
us for more than a century.
John Noël, Greenpeace USA deputy
climate program director:
This
is a vote that will live in infamy. This bill is what happens when a major
political party, in the grips of a personality cult, teams up with oil company
CEOs, hedge fund donors, and climate deniers. All you need to do is look at who
benefits from actively undercutting the clean energy industry that is creating
tens of thousands of jobs across political geographies.
The
megabill isn’t about reform—it’s about rewarding the super rich and doling out
fossil fuel industry handouts, all while dismantling the social safety nets on
which millions depend for stability. It is a bet against the future.
Ben Jealous, executive director
of the Sierra Club:
“This is a sad and scary day for all who work
to build up our communities, care for our friends and neighbors, and wish to
leave this planet in a better place for future generations. Instead of working
to make life better for American families and communities, what Donald Trump
and his loyalists in Congress have delivered today will mean higher energy
costs for working families and small businesses, the end of life-saving health
care that millions rely on, and ceding the race to build the clean energy economy
of tomorrow to China. Trump and Congressional Republicans have advanced the
most anti-environment, anti-job, and anti-American bill in history. The Sierra
Club will not forget it. America will not forget it.
Gretchen Goldman, president of
the Union of Concerned Scientists:
Our
country will be paying the price for these reckless policies for decades to
come.
In
passing this bill, lawmakers repeatedly overrode the needs and interests of
their constituents. When benefits are lost, when energy prices spike, when
major clean energy and clean transportation investments are canceled, when jobs
are cut, when climate-exacerbated extreme weather disasters hit, people should
know who they have to thank.
This
bill is a damning indictment of Congress’ priorities and values. Our country
needs policymakers willing to confront the challenges of our time and fight for
a better tomorrow, not sell out America for the benefit of a few.
Kelly Baden, vice president for
public policy at the Guttmacher Institute:
The
reconciliation bill is a sweeping attack on the health, rights and autonomy of
millions of people across the country. It would strip health coverage from
those who need it most, gut access to reproductive health care, and impose
dangerous restrictions that disproportionately harm low-income communities,
people of color, and those already facing systemic barriers to care.”
One
of the most egregious provisions in the bill would block Planned Parenthood and
other providers of abortion care from receiving Medicaid reimbursement for
contraceptive services and other care for an entire year. This politically
motivated exclusion could force one in three Planned Parenthood health centers
to close their doors, cutting off access to contraception, STI testing and
treatment, cancer screenings and abortion care for countless patients. These
are not just numbers—these are real people whose lives and futures are being
put at risk.
On
top of that, the bill’s broader Medicaid cuts represent a direct attack on the
health and economic security of people with low incomes. Medicaid is not a
luxury—it’s a lifeline. It ensures access to essential care, including sexual
and reproductive health services, for millions of people. Slashing this program
to finance tax cuts for the wealthy is not just wrong—it’s cruel.
Let’s
be clear: this bill is about advancing an extreme ideological agenda that
prioritizes control over compassion, and politics over public health.
Alexis McGill Johnson, president
and CEO of Planned Parenthood Federation of America:
The
reconciliation bill is a targeted attack on Planned Parenthood health centers
and patients that cannot stand. Everyone deserves access to high-quality,
affordable health care. That’s what we’ve been fighting for the last century —
and we’ll never stop. We’ll be suing the Trump administration to stop this
unlawful attack. See you in court.
Dr. Jamila Perritt, Physicians
for Reproductive Health president and CEO:
Federal
programs like Medicaid, CHIP, SNAP, as well as funding for full spectrum sexual
and reproductive health care are all left at the mercy of cowardly, out of
touch lawmakers who value junk science over the evidence-based practices that
keep our communities safe. Limitations on these essential programs will have
horrible consequences for tens of millions of people and for our entire health
care landscape. In contrast of its name, this bill is one of the ugliest
actions we have seen from the Trump Administration to date.
Only
six months into a second Trump term, we have seen Title X funding be stripped
away, the continued criminalization of those seeking lifesaving health care
like abortion, as well as politically motivated attacks on those in support of
full spectrum sexual and reproductive health care. This is not a coincidence –
it is intentional. This is not, nor has it ever been acceptable.
Rep.
Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.):
Because
my Republican colleagues cowered to special interests and their billionaire
donors, 17 million Americans will lose their health coverage. This passage
could cause 50,000 Americans to die each year because Republicans shamefully
voted to kick millions off Medicaid and failed to extend the premium tax
credits in the Affordable Care Act. It will also increase healthcare costs and
endanger access to care for all Americans. Rural hospitals will be forced to
shut down. Nursing homes and community health centers will be gravely impacted.
This
bill is the biggest transfer of wealth from the poor to the rich in history.
While working people will be devastated, billionaires will receive massive tax
cuts. Not only are the tax cuts permanent for the ultra-wealthy, any benefit to
low-income families is only temporary. It will deepen the wealth and income
inequality gap.
In
poll after poll, the American people are clear in their disdain for this bill.
From cuts to nutrition assistance to increasing the cost of college to higher
utility bills – the American people are clear-eyed in opposing it. Donald Trump
and Republicans know this, which is why they rammed this bill through. Every
single American will remember who chose to side with billionaires instead of
working people.
This
bill is morally bankrupt and an attack on working people. For those reasons, I
voted NO.”
Congressional Progressive Caucus
Chair Greg Casar (D-Texas):
“This
bill is a betrayal of working Americans. So that billionaires can buy bigger
yachts, millions of working people will be unable to afford to go to the
doctor, put food on the table, or keep the lights on.
For
years, Washington Republicans have talked a big game about becoming the party
of working people. This vote should be the final nail in the coffin of that
idea. In the end, Washington Republicans will simply betray the working class
people they won over in the last election. They’ve done what they always do:
take from the working class to give to the rich.
As
Democrats, we must make sure they never live that down.”
Rep. Rashida Tlaib (D-Mich.):
“This
bill is an act of violence against our communities. At a time of extreme income
and wealth inequality, while 60% of Americans are living paycheck to paycheck,
this budget is absolutely devastating for the working families we represent.”
Rep. Summer Lee (D-Pa.):
“Republicans
just passed one of the most harmful bills in modern history that will devastate
our communities for years to come.”
Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.):
“Republicans
in the House just cheered as they voted to kick 17 million people off their
healthcare.”
Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez
(D-N.Y.):
“I
don’t think anyone is prepared for what they just did w/ICE. This is not a
simple budget increase. It is an explosion—making ICE bigger than the FBI, U.S.
Bureau of Prisons, DEA, and others combined. It is setting up to make what’s
happening now look like child’s play. And people are disappearing.”
Rep. Ayanna Pressley (D-Mass.):
“Republicans
have passed a bill that will be a death sentence—denying millions medical care,
denying children food, and violently deporting immigrant families to
destabilized countries. This is unforgivable.”
Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-Wash.):
“Republicans
passed Trump’s Big Bad Betrayal Bill to kick 17 million Americans off their
healthcare for a billionaire tax cut. Cruel, horrifying, and outrageous. But we
must not lose hope. Democrats will not only fight back—we’ll fight forward,
press on, and justice will be won.”
Rep. Becca Ballint (D-Vt.):
“The
House shamefully passed Trump’s big ugly, horrific, terrible bill that will
leave 17 million people without health insurance. I, like every Democrat, voted
HELL NO. People are going to suffer. I’m horrified that Congress would pass
such a harmful piece of legislation.”
“I
never want to hear a Republican say they care about ‘fiscal responsibility’
ever again. This bill is the largest increase in our national debt in history.”
Rep. Maxwell Alejandro Frost
(D-Fla.):
House
Republicans just passed Trump’s evil, Big Ugly Budget. They caved, voting to
take health care away from 17 million people, slash food aid, and rob the poor
to reward the ultrarich. It’s the largest transfer of wealth from the working
class to billionaires in history. This is a dark day in America and a shameful
betrayal to those we serve. Our people deserve better and I will always fight
like hell to get it. The fight continues.
Joanna Kuebler, chief of programs
at America’s Voice:
Americans
are already recoiling against the harm done by this administration’s
deportation agenda—the masked ICE agents running amok; the industries and small
businesses worried about their future viability; the fear spreading in American
communities and the separations tearing apart American families.
Sadly,
we fear it will get all the worse with the new and unprecedented infusion of
tens of billions of dollars for Stephen Miller to fully scale the personal mass
deportation crusade he’s dreamed about since his teenage years. Earlier this
week, Vice President JD Vance admitted that slashing Medicaid, the tax cuts for
the wealthiest Americans, the fiscal recklessness and all of the other
unpopular and damaging provisions of this bill were ‘immaterial’ compared to
the ICE and immigration enforcement money.
Yet
Stephen Miller’s and MAGA’s dreams are most Americans’ nightmares.
Turbocharging mass deportation endangers our economy, our families, our
communities, and our history as a nation of immigrants.
Roots Action:
The
expansion of fascism is here:
– $74.9 billion for ICE detention and
removal
– $65.6 billion for CBP infrastructure,
hiring, tech
– $10 billion DHS slush fund
– $3.5 billion for state enforcementAnd
more!
Hamilton Nolan, independent
journalist :
This
bill contains enough money to build a new system of immigration detention
centers far bigger than the entire federal prison system. The American
Immigration Council says that it will be enough to facilitate the “daily
detention of at least 116,000 non-citizens.” It will let ICE hire more field
agents than the FBI. Its $170 billion in funding for Stephen Miller’s rabid
campaign to purge America of brown people is comparable to the total annual
funding for the United States Army.
Donald
Trump envisions himself as an all-powerful leader whose will is equal to law.
He is bent on revenge against his political enemies. He has installed extreme
loyalists in the Justice Department, the FBI, the Defense Department, the
Department of Homeland Security, and all other security departments. The courts
have declined to meaningfully restrain his abuses of these departments. This
budget will give him the final piece of the puzzle that he needs to achieve his
fever dream: a nationwide army of masked, unaccountable armed agents empowered
to snatch anyone they like off the streets, and the physical infrastructure to
imprison or deport those people at will. Thousands of men with guns,
unrestrained by judges or local police, who do not answer to Congress, who
point guns at the press, who arrest whoever they want, for reasons they do not
share, and do whatever they wish with those people. The implications of this
are going to make America a much darker place.
Aaron Reichlin-Melnick, American
Immigration Council senior fellow:
With
this vote, Congress makes ICE the highest-funded federal law enforcement agency
in history, with more money per year at its disposal over the next four years
than the budgets of the FBI, DEA, ATF, U.S. Marshals, and Bureau of Prisons
combined.
Astra Taylor, author and Strike
Debt co-founder:
The
debt, deportation, and death bill has passed. Congress further decimates care
work to fund violence work. ICE becomes the highest-funded federal law
enforcement agency ever known. It hasn’t been sold this way, but it’s a massive
public jobs program for fascists.
Uzra Zeya, CEO of Human Rights
First:
“As
millions of Americans lose access to health insurance, this bill forks over
more than $150 billion to supercharge the policies of grave harm we’ve seen
these past six months. It will fund more disappearances of people seeking
asylum in our country, more masked agents in our courtrooms and neighborhoods
to detain and manhandle those following the rules to be here, and more prisons
where families, including infants, can now be incarcerated indefinitely due to
this Big, Ugly, Betrayal of a bill.”
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