The Washington Post: Medicaid Cuts & Trillions in Debt: What's in Donald Trump's Bill

"On this episode, The Washington Post's Libby Casey, Rhonda Colvin and James Hohmann break down a busy week in Washington, starting with the shocking shooting of two Israeli embassy employees. Then, the crew dives into the GOP's "big, beautiful" budget bill: What's in it, what the sticking points were, and what had to be negotiated.

Later, the crew breaks down the chaotic meeting in the Oval Office between Trump and South African President Cyril Ramaphosa – and how Trump is using Oval Office meetings to set up televised showdowns with other world leaders.

Plus, technology reporter Drew Harwell joins the show to preview Trump's morally-murky dinner with investors in his crypto meme coin." 

Source:The Washington Post with a look at South African President Cyril Ramaphosa and The MAGA Don.

From The Washington Post

From Derik Schneider earlier on The New Democrat: 

"I know I'm not making any news by saying this, but it's important and it leads to my overall point about this bill: at the end of the day, if House Republicans just had a 1 seat majority and every singe House Democrat voted no on this legislation, but every Republican voted yes, the bill would still pass. And the bill is an accomplishment for the House Republican Leadership (led by Speaker Mike Johnson and Majority Leader Steve Scalise) in this sense because they can say that they showed that they can govern and get their agenda passed. 

But in the broader world, the BBB is a pretty minor accomplishment because of the fallout that now awaits House Republicans going into 2026, with the increases of the national debt, deficit, and interest rates, that will affect at least 90% of the country in a negative way. And that's just the start of the fallout...

From The New Democrat

And as Ederik Schneider said: 

"So when I look at the bill, (that Donald Trump calls the Big Beautiful Bill) it takes me back to the early and mid-2000s, when you had a Republican President (in George W. Bush) and a Republican Congress. 

President Bush governed on "deficits don't matter"... his own Vice President Dick Cheney literally stated that in 2003. And he simply didn't want to cut government spending because he ran as a New Republican who cared about people, but also believed in "free markets". So as long as a Republican administration was saying "deficits don't matter", you weren't going to have a Republican Congress challenge their own President and risk their own reelection chances. 

So what the Republican Congress's of 2003-04, and 2005-06, did was to say: "We don't believe in budget cuts or tax hikes. So we're going to fund our own new budget priorities, without paying for them. And cut taxes for everyone, without paying for them. And everyone in the country will thank us for that. Well, enough people to keep us in power... 

From The New Democrat

So if you want to look at this bill from a Democratic perspective... I could do that for you and then I'll get into what I think about this legislation as well later on. 

Every single House Democrat did their jobs here. Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries and Minority Whip Katherine Clark got 214 no votes from their own caucus, in a bill that does some have some real middle class tax cuts in it, like no taxes on tips and a few other things. But there's at least 1 middle class tax hike in it (that I've found so far) dealing with the Child Tax Credit. And that's important and because as the Trump Administration gets ready to borrow trillions of more dollars, that the House has just approved, and we'll see what the Senate does, but if they pass something similar here, that's a great issue for Congressional Democrats next year. 

So think about this: while interest rates remain high, while the Stock Market continues to struggle, while people on Medicaid are losing that coverage, including seniors, while President Trump's own voters lose their Medicaid, Food Stamps, and disaster relief... the deficit that's already approaching $2T, the economy continues to struggle because of the Trump trade war, House and Senate Democrats will have a major opportunity to start building their Blue Wave. Which the Midwest would be a major factor for House Democrats, if this wave happens.

When I'm talking about a Blue Wave, I'm not just winning back New York and New Jersey for the House, but making real plays for the Senate in North Carolina, Maine, and even Iowa... 3 states that depend on Medicaid, Food Stamps, and disaster relief... states that can't afford to see their cost of livings go up. And maybe even Louisiana and Texas, especially if Senators Bill Cassidy and John Cornyn get primaried out and replaced by MAGA candidates, who would have to run statewide in those 2 states. 

As far as the "Big Beautiful Bill": the phrase "guns and butter" was used a lot in the 2000s when talking about President George W. Bush's economic and foreign policy. What that was about was the President taking us to war twice in Afghanistan and Iraq, cutting taxes by trillions of dollars twice, doubling the size of Medicare, (which is an entitlement program) and telling everyone that nobody has to pay for anything because as Vice President Dick Cheney infamously said: "Deficit don't matter". 

Well if you are familiar with the Stock Market crash of 2008, which led to the Great Recession of 2008-09, you know that deficits do matter. it keeps interest rates up, it weakens the U.S. Dollar, which makes it very difficult for anyone who isn't a millionaire or better, to borrow any money. 

The "Big Beautiful Bill", is really poorly named... unless it's the title of a political horror film and you give it a soft title like that so you don't scare the hell out of any potential viewers of it before they see the film. This is really just Donald Trump Manhattan Economics here. He personally has already bankrupt himself 6 times: why not the largest and most important economy and government in the world as well? 

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