Common sense might suggest that congressional Republicans would want to know basic details about their giant reconciliation package, such as how much it would cost and the practical implications of its provisions. GOP lawmakers are, after all, federal policymakers. It stands to reason that they’d care enough about governing to want to legislate with open eyes.
But that’s not the case. Just as Republicans scrambled in 2017 to pass massive tax breaks without waiting for a score from the Congressional Budget Office, GOP lawmakers decided to do the same thing in 2025, deliberately choosing willful ignorance about their own legislation.
That did not, however, stop congressional Democrats from asking the CBO to scrutinize the House Republicans’ proposal, and as The Associated Press reported, the nonpartisan budget office’s findings were quite brutal.
A fresh analysis from the Congressional Budget Office said the tax provisions would increase the federal deficit by $3.8 trillion over the decade, while the changes to Medicaid, food stamps and other services would tally $1 trillion in reduced spending. The lowest-income households in the U.S. would see their resources drop, while the highest ones would see a boost, the CBO said.
For Republicans, there’s plenty of data to chew on in the CBO’s newly released findings, but if GOP officials are looking for encouraging news in the report, they won’t find any. The nonpartisan budget analysts found that the Republicans’ proposal would:
- decrease household resources for the poorest Americans by 2% in the short term, and 4% by 2033 as additional GOP cuts take effect;
- increase household resources for the wealthiest Americans, thanks almost entirely to Republican tax breaks;
- increase the budget deficit by $3.8 trillion;
- take health care benefits from roughly 15 million Americans;
- cut roughly $700 million from Medicaid;
- and cut $267 billion from SNAP (better known as food stamps).
Democratic Rep. Brendan Boyle of Pennsylvania, the ranking member on the House Budget Committee, said in a statement, “This is what Republicans are fighting for — lining the pockets of their billionaire donors while children go hungry and families get kicked off their health care. CBO’s nonpartisan analysis makes it crystal clear: Donald Trump and House Republicans are selling out the middle class to make the ultra-rich even richer. Every word out of Trump’s mouth about helping working Americans was a lie.”
A governing party would see results like these and slam the brakes, taking care to start improving their radical and regressive bill before voting on it. The contemporary Republican Party, however, will ignore the CBO’s findings and hit the gas, hoping members support the legislation before the facts gain traction.
As of this writing, the so-called “One Big Beautiful Bill Act” is still under consideration in the House Budget Committee — its members began work on this at 1 a.m. local time — though it’s expect to clear the panel in the coming hours. House Speaker Mike Johnson and his leadership team have indicated they’d like to see a floor vote before the day’s end, though some far-right members continue to suggest that’s unlikely. Watch this space.
