This Bill is Not Quite So Beautiful …

Trump’s Bill Cuts Medicare, Gives to Pentagon. Rep. Massie Says Bill Adds $20 TRILLION to the Debt

Republicans can only afford to have three members vote ‘no’ to stop Trump’s “big, beautiful bill.” Representative Thomas Massie said that he is opposed to the bill that adds $20 trillion to the debt over 10 years. He said, “I don’t think he [Mr Trump] wants to talk about cutting spending.”

Trump emphasized that he does not want Medicare touched, and said that only waste, fraud and abuse would be cut. Representative Ted Lieu observed, “I don’t think the President has read the bill. He said ‘Don’t F around with Medicaid.’ The bulk of their bill messes around with Medicaid.”

Meanwhile, zero cuts were made to the Pentagon, instead, about $10 billion was funneled into it.

About 80 million Americans get Medicare and 70 million get Medicaid. Analysis from the congressional budget office shows that 7.6 million people would lose their Medicaid coverage if the current House proposal becomes law. 63% of nursing home care is funded by Medicaid. The bill would also cut 3 million people from the SNAP food stamps program.

The Joint Committee on Taxation (JCT) estimated that the bill as written would increase deficits by $3.8 trillion through to 2034.

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From The Telegraph:

Donald Trump has told Republicans in Congress not to “f— around” with his “big, beautiful bill” in a closed-door meeting to quash dissent.

The US president met with GOP representatives on Tuesday, urging them to unite around the budget reconciliation bill which will be crucial to driving through his massive domestic programme.

“Don’t f— around with Medicaid,” he told fiscal conservatives, who have pushed for cuts to the programme providing health insurance to low-income Americans, while urging moderates to drop their backing for tax relief.

Tuesday’s meeting was a test of Mr Trump’s ability to enforce his will on Congress and unite warring factions of his party behind his “big, beautiful bill” on energy, tax and border security.

Although he insisted before heading into the closed-doors gathering that the party was united behind his agenda barring “one or two grandstanders”, at least eight Republicans said immediately afterwards they were still opposed.

Trump ‘losing patience’

Republicans have a razor-thin majority in the House of Representatives and can only afford to lose three votes if the bill is to pass through the chamber.

While fiscal conservatives want Medicaid cuts to limit the growth of the deficit, other Republicans have warned it would hurt the party’s popular appeal and see it lose control of the House in the mid-terms next year.

A senior White House official said Mr Trump is “losing patience with all holdout factions”, according to The Wall Street Journal. A House Republican described the US president’s attitude: “He’s done with this.”

Andy Harris of Maryland, chairman of the House Freedom Caucus, which is pushing for Medicaid cuts, said he would not support the bill and that Republicans were “a long ways away” from a deal.

Chip Roy, a Texas congressman and another member of the caucus, said the bill needed to “deliver on the spending restraint” and was not “exactly where it needs to be, yet”.

Mr Trump pledged to oppose slashing the health insurance programme during his White House run last year, although he told Republicans on Tuesday that savings would be generated by addressing “waste, fraud and abuse”.

Marjorie Taylor Greene, the hardline Republican from Georgia, was one of the staunchest defenders of protecting Medicaid.

She has repeatedly warned her party that it risks losing touch with its base and on Tuesday told her colleagues that Mr Trump had not been elected to cut Medicaid, a source familiar with the meeting told The Telegraph.

Writing in The New York Times last week, Josh Hawley, the Missouri senator, said slashing the health programme would be “morally wrong and politically suicidal”.

It would mean “workers and their children will lose their health care” and end “any chance of us becoming a working-class party”, he argued.

A White House spokesman said: “President Trump and Republicans are protecting and preserving Medicaid for the Americans who the programme was intended to be a lifeline for: pregnant women, children, disabled individuals, and seniors.”

Analysis from the congressional budget office shows that 7.6 million people would lose their Medicaid coverage if the current House proposal becomes law.

Warren Davidson, an ally of Mr Trump’s, said he would vote against the bill as it stands because it “grows the deficit this Congress”.

The Joint Committee on Taxation (JCT) estimated that the bill as written would increase deficits by $3.8 trillion through to 2034.

from:  https://needtoknow.news/2025/05/trumps-bill-cuts-medicare-gives-to-pentagon-rep-massie-says-bill-adds-20-trillion-to-the-debt/