I’ve always maintained that to understand the values of a political party, look at its budget proposals. Never has this been truer than in the past week when Republicans passed their new budget, endorsed by President Donald Trump.
As Josh Bivens, chief economist at the Economic Policy Institute, stated, the Republican budget essentially dismisses any idea that the Republican Party is the party of the working class. “Their budget,” wrote Bivens, “says the opposite.”
In their budget, Republicans take money from the poor, including food from infants and children, and give it to the rich in the form of tax cuts. As Bivens outlined, “the spending cuts to health care and food assistance programs in the bill will average about $120 billion each year over the next decade, while the new tax cuts for households already making over $500,000 each year will average over $120 billion per year.”
One could possibly make a case for all the cuts if it were to address the nation’s growing debt. However, Trump’s budget transfers that money to the rich and grows the federal debt by several trillion dollars in the process.
The Congressional Budget Office estimates that the poorest 20% of households will experience income losses of nearly 4%. In comparison, the wealthiest 10% will see gains of over 2%. In terms of dollars, reports the Tax Policy Center, “millionaire earners will see an average after-tax income increase of $75,000 in 2026.”
As stated by Matt Labash, former national correspondent at The Weekly Standard, “It screws the poor and rewards the rich. Anyone still laboring under the illusion that this is a populist administration needs to understand that ‘for the people’ means ‘only some of the people,’ usually the millionaires and billionaires. Meet the new elitists, same as the old elitists.”
Compare Trump’s priorities in his “Big, Beautiful Bill” to what Democrats did in 2014 under President Barack Obama’s signature legislation, the Affordable Care Act (ACA). In 2013, 14.5% of the American population had no health care insurance. As a result of the ACA, by 2023, only 7.9%of Americans, including just 5% of children, were uninsured, with 44 million people enrolled in an ACA-related health coverage.
Last week, on July 4, after promising not to cut Medicaid, Trump signed into law nearly $1 trillion in Medicaid funding cuts. They also made significant changes to the Affordable Care Act, making it more difficult for Americans to enroll for coverage. According to independent assessments, between 17 and 19 million Americans are expected to lose their health insurance coverage when the entire law is fully implemented.
See the difference? Democrats try to make things better for ordinary Americans, while Republicans take care of their rich friends at the expense of ordinary Americans.
The Republican budget adds trillions of dollars to our nation’s debt. Adding to Trump’s tax cuts mainly for the rich during his first term, Trump will have added more to the national debt than any president in our nation’s history. This is from the “fiscally responsible” Republicans who like to talk about the debt problem, especially when Democrats are in the White House, but never do anything about it, even as they make the most significant cuts to social programs in the history of our nation.
For those who believe that Medicaid cuts only affect the poor, these cuts directly impact the health care of all Americans who use local hospitals, rehabilitation centers, long-term care facilities, and any health care program supported by Medicaid.
As reported by Ailia Zehra, writing for The Hill, the Community Hospital in Curtis, Nebraska, seeing the writing on the wall, “is shutting its doors after more than 30 years due to mounting financial pressures and looming federal cuts tied to Medicaid.” The announcement was made hours after the House passed the Republican budget. It isn’t just Medicaid users who will lose the services of this hospital; everyone in Curtis, rich and poor, will have to do without its services. This will be repeated in dozens of rural communities over the next several years as hospitals and long-term care facilities realize a reduction in their Medicaid reimbursements.
“Rural hospitals are especially at risk because a large proportion of their patient population is dependent on Medicaid funding,” said Michael Shepherd, a health policy researcher at the University of Michigan. A report by the Health Policy at Families USA said the Republican cuts to Medicaid will put at least 435 hospitals “with negative net incomes” and “at serious risk of closure.” A study by the University of North Carolina found that at least 338 rural hospitals are likely to close as a direct result of the Medicaid cuts.
On average, approximately 62% of nursing home revenue comes from the Medicaid program. The Republican budget will result in substantial reductions to nursing home funding, already inadequate, and the closure of many of these long-term facilities for the elderly and disabled.
While the United States needs more hospitals and long-term care facilities in the face of a growing elderly population, the Trump administration is, instead, spending $45 billion on immigrant detention centers. While the U.S. needs investments in education for our children’s future, Republicans cut education funding at all levels, including Head Start. They even added a tax on college endowments used to fund college scholarships for low-income and middle-class families.
Note their values and priorities.
The Republican budget is an attack on ordinary Americans. They changed Biden’s student debt repayment program for poor and middle-income families, forcing them to pay significantly higher monthly premiums. They reduced clean energy investments, putting the United States at a disadvantage in meeting future energy needs and competing with other nations for clean energy technology and jobs. As stated by the Clean Investment Monitor, “the United States has been experiencing a boom in clean energy investments, with $321 billion spent and $522 billion more on the way.” Many of these projects are located in Republican congressional districts and are expected to result in job losses.
Some Republicans are touting aspects of the bill that reduce some taxes on Social Security payments and tips for wait staff. However, these tax cuts disappear in 2028 and only apply to a small number of Americans (60% of Americans already pay zero federal taxes on their Social Security benefits). While Republicans made the tax cuts for the wealthy permanent, these minor tax cuts for a few ordinary Americans are short-lived.
Republicans are touting a record stock market. However, the stock market had already reached these record highs by the end of the Biden administration. It has taken the Trump administration five months to recover from market losses resulting from Trump’s tariff mishaps. Republicans are touting 147,000 new jobs in June; however, that is less than half the average job growth under Biden, who averaged over 333,000 new jobs per month over four years.
Inflation, under Trump, rose slightly from 2.3% in May to 2.4% in June, the same level it was when Biden left office. While Trump promised to lower prices “on day one,” economists expect inflation to continue rising due to higher health care costs projected as a result of the Republicans’ budget and Trump’s ongoing tariff war.
It was a good day for the rich, but not so much for anyone else. And that just about sums up Republican values and priorities.
Tom Zirpoli is the Laurence J. Adams Distinguished Chair in Special Education Emeritus at McDaniel College. He writes from Westminster. His column appears on Wednesdays. Email him at tzirpoli@mcdaniel.edu.
