The House passed its massive budget package last month, and now it’s in the Senate, where Majority Leader John Thune hopes to get it passed and onto Trump’s desk by the July 4th holiday.
Speaker Mike Johnson yesterday denied that 4.8 million people will lose Medicaid coverage by countering that they won’t “unless they choose to do so.”1 And last week, Senator Joni Ernst (R-IA) dismissed that loss of Medicaid could cause deaths with a chilling remark: “Well, we’re all going to die.”2
These statements make clear just how willfully some lawmakers deny the real-life consequences of these decisions.
Medicaid and SNAP are lifelines for families, children, seniors, and people with disabilities. Cutting these programs isn’t just bad policy—it’s a moral failure.
For millions, Medicaid means access to life-saving prescriptions, cancer treatment, prenatal care, mental health support, and the ability to see a doctor at all. For others, SNAP provides critical help putting food on the table every single day. And, some families face the double whammy of potentially losing health coverage and food assistance at a time that many of us are grappling with higher costs. Cuts to these programs will increase hunger, drive up health costs, and put lives in danger.
No one in America should go hungry or without health care in order to pay for more tax breaks for the rich. It is immoral and unjust to cut Medicaid and SNAP to offset some of the cost of trillions of dollars in tax breaks that overwhelmingly benefit the richest 1% and billion-dollar corporations.3
Cuts to Medicaid and SNAP aren’t just numbers in a budget proposal. These programs represent our shared commitment to dignity, equity, and basic human decency. And these decisions will directly harm families, children, seniors, people with disabilities, and low-income workers across the country.
