Robert Reich: What You Need To Share About The "One Big Beautiful" Ugly Horrible Bill

"The old professor in me thinks the best way to convey to you how utterly awful the so-called “one big beautiful bill” passed by the House last night actually is would be to give you this short ten-question exam. (Answers are in parenthesis, but first try to answer without looking at them.)

1. Does the House’s “one big beautiful bill” cut Medicare? (Answer: Yes, by an estimated $500 billion.)

2. Because the bill cuts Medicaid, how many Americans are expected to lose Medicaid coverage? (At least 8.6 million.)

3. Will the tax cut in the bill benefit the rich or the poor or everyone?(Overwhelmingly, the rich.)

4. How much will the top 0.1 percent of earners stand to gain from it? (Nearly $390,000 per year).

5. If you figure in the benefit cuts and the tax cuts, will Americans making between about $17,000 and $51,000 gain or lose? (They’ll lose about $700 a year).

6. How about Americans with incomes less than $17,000? (They’ll lose more than $1,000 per year on average).

7. How much will the bill add to the federal debt? ($3.8 trillion over 10 years.)

8. Who will pay the interest on this extra debt? (All of us, in both our tax payments and higher interest rates for mortgages, car loans, and all other longer-term borrowing.)

9. Who collects this interest? (People who lend to the U.S. government, 70 percent of whom are American and most of whom are wealthy.)

10. Bonus question: Is the $400 million airplane from Qatar a gift to the United States for every future president to use, or a gift to Trump for his own personal use? (It’s a personal gift because he’ll get to use it after he leaves the presidency.)

Most Americans are strongly opposed to all of these things, according to polls. But if you knew the answers to these ten questions, you’re likely to be in a very tiny minority. That’s because of (1) distortions and cover-ups emanating from Trump and magnified by Fox News and other rightwing outlets. (2) A public that’s overwhelmed with the blitzkrieg of everything Trump is doing, and can’t focus on this. (3) Outright silencing of many in the media who fear retaliation from the Trump regime if they reveal things that Trump doesn’t want revealed.

Please do your part: Share this as widely as possible."

Source:Robert Reich on Facebook.

From Robert Reich

From CBS News: 

"The House passed the GOP budget bill early Thursday morning by a narrow margin after last-minute changes were made to satisfy Republican holdouts. CBS News' Caitlin Huey-Burns joins with more." 

Source:CBS News with a look at Speaker of the House Mike Johnson (MAGA, Shreveport, Louisiana)

From CBS News

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. 

So why is the BBB a problem for House Republicans and perhaps Senate Republicans as well? 

1. The national Republican Party, (I believe, at least) is in a "damned if they do, damned if they don't" situation: they pass this very unpopular bill, that literally raises taxes on the middle class by limiting the Child Tax Credit, and cuts Medicaid funding as well, which affects MAGA's own voters in rural communities, which goes on top of the FEMA cuts that these voters are already having to live with... the House is now probably gone for the Republicans next year. And now we're just talking about how many seats Democrats will pick up: will it be 10, (which might be a small victory for House Republicans) or could be 15, 20, 25, and perhaps the Senate is in play as well, if Democrats put a wave together next year. 

2. But if Congressional Republicans (House & Senate) weren't able  to pass anything here, (for whatever the reasons) it just backs up 1 of the Democratic arguments that Republicans don't know how to govern... at least by themselves. And Independents would turn on them because of the gridlock and the fact that the Republican Party was completely in charge of the Federal Government the last 2 years. And MAGA would stay home on Election Day because the Republicans didn't do anything for them. 

It's obvious why Robert Reich doesn't like this bill. Show me a Socialist who's ever supported any tax relief for anybody and I'll show my ocean beachfront property in Wyoming, with a clear view of Russia from there. Show me government budget cuts that aren't related to defense, intelligence, and law enforcement that any Socialist has ever supported, I'll sell you my winter ski resort in Miami Beach. But if Democrats play this right, (big if) they now have 3 key issues, just on the economy that they can use to create their Blue Wave next year, that are now in the BBB: 

Middle class tax hikes

Health care cuts to small towns and rural communities

And cuts to disaster relief that primarily affects small towns and rural communities. 

And this is how Democrats go not from winning a bare majority in the House next year, but instead 20 seats, perhaps more than that in the House and have a real shot of winning back the Senate as well, because they'll be able to not just win everywhere in the Northeast, but now will be able to win back the Midwest as well, because of the middle class cuts in the BBB. 

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