Republicans suddenly realize voters hate their health care cuts
New disclosures from Republican lawmakers reveal concerns within the party that voters may punish the GOP if proposed cuts to health care in the Donald Trump-backed “One Big, Beautiful Bill” become law. The measure, which squeaked through the House without any Democratic support late last month, is currently under consideration in the Senate.
Politico reported on Wednesday that House Speaker Mike Johnson is telling Senate Republican leadership that he fears the party could lose its razor-thin majority if further cuts to Medicaid are added.
The outlet reports that Senate Majority Leader John Thune is “under immense pressure to water down the Medicaid provisions the Senate GOP is counting on for hundreds of billions of dollars worth of savings.”
Republican Sen. Thom Tillis of North Carolina has also been sounding the alarm for his party.
The Hill reported that Tillis told Thune that the proposed cuts could lead to Republicans losing the House and the Senate. A source who witnessed the discussion told the outlet that Tillis discussed how the GOP proposal would cut services in his home state and told Thune, “this will be devastating to my state.”
Tillis is up for reelection in 2026 and is one of the Republican Party’s most vulnerable Senate candidates. He won his 2020 race by less than 2 percentage points, and while Trump won North Carolina in 2024, the state has been decided by less than 4 percentage points in the past five presidential elections.
Additional pressure is being exerted on Republicans from within by a group of over a dozen House Republicans. The members, who hold vulnerable seats, sent a letter to Thune and Johnson on Tuesday, saying they wouldn’t back a revised bill that included more health care cuts.
Thune’s predecessor in Senate leadership, Republican Sen. Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, is also trying to prevent his party from getting more bad headlines over health care. After it was reported that McConnell said in a private meeting that voters would “get over it,” referring to the cuts, his spokesperson tried to claim his comments referred to people purportedly abusing Medicaid benefits.
Republicans have been trying to convince the public that the proposed cuts will not affect the public at large, but this is false. The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office has estimated that 16 million would lose care under the bill.
Even though public opinion polls show Americans opposed to the bill’s provisions, Trump is already planning a victory party to celebrate the bill’s passage. The party’s congressional campaign committee also plans to attack Democrats for voting against it.
Democratic leaders like Sen. Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts have been lambasting Republicans over the bill, with an emphasis on the massive impact it will have on day-to-day life for millions.
Trump has a lot riding on the legislative success of the bill.
In his first term, two of his most humiliating moments came after the failure to repeal the Affordable Care Act and his inability to pass an infrastructure bill (though former President Joe Biden passed one). Trump’s signature legislative achievement, the 2017 tax cut, failed to stimulate the economy.