One Big Beautiful Bill Act / Act should be passed
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Position: Act should be passed
This position addresses the topic One Big Beautiful Bill Act.
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Trump’s BBB is a massive, larded-up spending bill. The federal government is already $1.8 trillion in debt, and this bill adds another $3.8 trillion on top of it, more than doubling the current deficit. These numbers may sound conceptual, but they have real world consequences for average Americans. The U.S. debt-to-GDP is now upward of 120% and growing. When we’re leveraged to the hilt like this, we’re likely to get higher interest and Treasury rates, which makes the cost of borrowing more expensive. Home equity loans, mortgage rates, car loans, credit card debt — they could all be more expensive. | 
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From 'Big, beautiful bill' shows how GOP has deserted conservatism, by S. E. Cupp (Chicago Sun-Times, May 22, 2025) (view)
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Extending and expanding Trump’s 2017 tax cuts, which otherwise expire this year, would cost nearly $4.5 trillion over 10 years, $5.8 trillion if the cuts are permanent. (Mandating that tax cuts expire after a time, as Trump did in 2017, is an old budget gimmick to understate a bill’s cost. The politicians know they’ll just extend the tax breaks, as we’re seeing now.) The bill’s proposed spending increases for the military, immigration enforcement and deportations would cost about $600 billion more. |
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From The ‘One Big Beautiful Bill’ is a big, ugly mess, by Jackie Calmes (Los Angeles Times, May 21, 2025) (view)
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In fiscal 2019, federal outlays totaled $4.45 trillion, or 20.6% of gross domestic product. This year, according to the Congressional Budget Office’s January 2025 projection, total outlays will be $7.03 trillion, or 23.3% of GDP. That’s a 58% increase over six years. The CBO projects federal outlays will total $89.3 trillion across fiscal 2026-35. Much of the blame goes to pandemic spending, but lockdowns are long over. There’s nothing now to justify this abnormal level of government spending. |
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From The Ugly Truth About the ‘Big Beautiful Bill’, by Ron Johnson (The Wall Street Journal, May 12, 2025) (view)
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We’re no hard-liners when it comes to deficits and debt, but even a government that spends more than it takes in needs to be prudent. At more than $36.2 trillion, the national debt is now 120% of the U.S. gross domestic product. This bill would likely send it past 130% by 2034, heading toward 150% by mid-century. |
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If the OBBB cut taxes while tending to the debt and wisely cut spending across the federal government, it would at least be an internally consistent expression of Republican philosophy, an attempt to radically shrink the footprint of the federal government. Instead, the same Republican Party that used to want to pare back government spending would shell out $168 billion for immigration and border enforcement. As the Cato Institute points out, “In FY 2025…Congress allocated nearly $34 billion to immigration and border enforcement agencies. That’s 36 times more than what is provided for tax and financial crimes enforcement (IRS-Treasury), 21 times more than funding for firearms enforcement (ATF), 13 times more than drug enforcement (DEA), and eight times more than the FBI budget to enforce effectively everything else.” |
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From Trump’s big ugly: One Big Beautiful Bill will do great damage, by New York Daily News editorial board (New York Daily News, June 15, 2025) (view)
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Electric vehicle sales continue to increase, while combustion-engine vehicles still dominate the market. This is what an energy abundance agenda looks like. Texas is living proof that ideological rigidity on energy is self-defeating. Trump's budget bill views the clean energy versus fossil fuel debate as a zero-sum game as opposed to an integrated ecosystem with opportunities for multiple technologies and economic actors to thrive. |
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From Trump budget bill could cripple wind and solar industry in Texas, by Nick Powell (Houston Chronicle, July 3, 2025) (view)
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Former Gov. Sam Brownback ran almost exactly this same play in 2012. Income tax cuts weighted toward the wealthy, based on an underlying, but deeply flawed, theory that those cuts would spur a burst of economic growth the likes of which we had never seen. It was supposed to cover the damage from shortening one leg of the “three-legged stool” (income, sales and property taxes) that supports the state government. The growth never materialized and the result of the “Brownback Tax Experiment” was perennial budget shortfalls, followed by traumatic cuts to public services. |
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From Hey America. It’s Kansas. We’ve done the ‘Big Beautiful Bill’ and know how it ends, by Dion Lefler (The Miami Herald, July 3, 2025) (view)
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Conservatives and Trumpers alike believe that the pursuit of happiness is a path you walk alone, without help or guidance from those who have come before. But people like me, who had to work hard to get where I am, know that success is made with people who reach their hand out in help and a whole lot of luck. For millions of Americans, that help comes from the government, and Trump is now making it a shell of itself. |
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From Trump’s ‘Big Beautiful Bill’ means the end of the real pursuit of happiness, by LeBron Antonio Hill (The Miami Herald, July 2, 2025) (view)
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In recent years, clean energy technology has been one of the fastest-growing manufacturing sectors of the U.S. economy. The GOP bill would cripple it. Hundreds of billions of dollars in cuts in solar and wind subsidies would devastate both industries. |
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From Trump's 'big, beautiful bill' will end America’s time as a great power, by Michael A. Cohen (MSNBC, July 1, 2025) (view)
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The bill creates the largest transfer of wealth ever, thanks to tax cuts for the ultrarich. The slashing of $1.1 trillion in spending for Medicaid would result in roughly 12 million elderly and vulnerable Americans losing health coverage. The Senate bill shifts the costs of the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, known as SNAP or food stamps, to some states — essentially snatching food from hungry children to give tax breaks to the wealthiest among us. |
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From Donald Trump’s shortsighted, ugly, terrible, horrible, no good, very bad bill, by The Philadelphia Inquirer editorial board (The Philadelphia Inquirer, July 1, 2025) (view)
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Additionally, the big ugly mess includes no tax on tips, social security and overtime pay. Neither Trump nor Republicans more generally have made a case for why these types of income are deserving of exempt status, and they amount to nothing more than a populist bribe of voters. These policies add hundreds of billions more to the revenue decreases from the tax cut extension. |
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From Senate just passed Trump's Big Beautiful Bill – and made it even uglier, by Dace Potas (USA Today, July 1, 2025) (view)
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