Yesterday, after a 27 hour “Vote A Rama”, the U.S. Senate approved Trump’s “Big Beautiful Bill” by the narrowest of margins. In fact, the vote was 50 senators in favor, and 50 against, with Vice-president Vance casting the tie-breaking vote in favor. The bill now goes back to the House of Representatives. It will probably be passed there, because enough House members will “cave” on their move cherished values.
I had hoped that some ethical Republican senators would make the “BBB”, the Big Beautiful Bill, a bit better. They dashed my hopes. They dashed the hopes of our citizens. They made the BBB even worse…they made it more “sinful”. Let me clarify. We are not a theocracy. We are a pluralistic democracy, albeit a very flawed democracy. Nevertheless, we as a nation have established legislation upon principles of social ethics borrowed from many places, including from religions (Judaism, Christianity, and others). When the proposals of the BBB fail to meet the most basic ethical requirements of the Judeo-Christian Scriptures, it is sinful. Let’s look at three of the most immoral components of the BBB.
The Senate Version Would Raise the Federal Debt by $3.3 Trillion
Whereas the House version of the BBB would raise the federal debt by $2.4 trillion, the Senate proposal would add at least $3.3 trillion to federal deficits over a decade, according to the most recent analysis from the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office. Let’s call this (spending more money than we bring in) for what it really is: Stealing! Our contemporary generation is stealing from future generations! We all have heard this most basic of the Ten Commandments: “Thou Shalt Not Steal”. Democrats in the White House and in Congress have been guilty of raising the debt as frequently as Republicans, but Trump increased the debt more in his first term than any president in our national history. In the BBB, the Republican senators are enabling Trump 2.0 to do a repeat performance of his thievery.
The Senate Version Would Cause 11.8 Million People to Lose Their Health Insurance
According to the Congressional Budget Office, the Senate version of the legislation would mean 11.8 million Americans will lose their health insurance by 2034 as federal spending on Medicaid, Medicare and Obamacare is reduced by roughly $1.1 trillion over that period. Let me repeat that number: 11.8 million of our neighbors will lose their health insurance! That is just the opposite of the Golden Rule: “Do unto Others as You would have Them Do unto You”. President Trump promised us that there would be no cuts to Medicare or to Medicaid. Given that it was the same Trump who pressured the senators to make these cuts, “we can trust the president to break his promises”.
The Senate Version Would Cause the Poor to Become Poorer and the Rich to Become Richer
The Republican version of the BBB will widen the gap between the poor and the rich. According to the best estimates, the poorest citizens will experience a 2% decline in their economic levels while the richest will increase their wealth by 4%. The BBB is actually taking money away from the poor to give a tax break to the most affluent among us. The bill extends nearly $4 trillion in tax cuts first passed in 2017 and partially pays for them by slashing spending on safety net programs: Medicare, Medicaid, the SNAP food program. Thousands and thousands of our citizens will suffer from unnecessary illnesses and pre-mature death.
The God described in the Scriptures hates any legislation that causes such pain. The God who fed manna to the Israelites in the desert wanted all to have “enough”. That same God later established the law of “gleaning”, so that no one would go hungry. In the Christian Scriptures, Jesus told his followers that apathy toward the poor, the sick, and the imprisoned, was, in fact, directed towards himself. In taking up a collection for the starving, persecuted believers in Jerusalem, the Apostle Paul told Gentile Christians that God’s goal was “equality” in which no one had too much while others did not have enough (2 Corinthians 8-9).
The BBB breaks God’s heart. Representatives in the House: please vote it down, while you are still able to do so.
Lindy Scott 