Did anyone see Stephan Millers defense of this bill? If he’s to be believed (and I do) the Republicans are completely mischaracterizing almost every aspect of it. Here’s the text of it:
Update from Stephen Miller: “I’ve seen a few claims making the rounds on the Big Beautiful Bill that require correction.
The first is that it doesn’t “codify the DOGE cuts.” A reconciliation bill, which is a budget bill that passes with 50 votes, is limited by senate rules to “mandatory” spending only — eg Medicaid and Food Stamps. The senate rules prevent it from cutting “discretionary” spending — eg the Department of Education or federal grants. The DOGE cuts are overwhelmingly discretionary, not mandatory. The bill saves more than 1.6 TRILLION in mandatory spending, including the largest-ever welfare reform. A remarkable achievement.
I’ve also seen claims the bill increases the deficit. This lie is based on a CBO accounting gimmick. Income tax rates from the 2017 tax cut are set to expire in September. They were always planned to be permanent. CBO says maintaining *current* rates adds to the deficit, but by definition leaving these income tax rates unchanged cannot add one penny to the deficit. The bill’s spending cuts REDUCE the deficit against the current law baseline, which is the only correct baseline to use.
Another fantastically false claim is that the bill spends trillions of dollars. This is just completely invented out of whole cloth. This is not a ten year budget bill—it doesn’t “fund” almost any operations of government, which are funded in the annual budget bills (which this is not). In other words, if this bill passed, but the annual budget bill did not, there would be no government funding. Under the math that critics are using, if we passed a one paragraph reconciliation bill that cut simply 50 billion in food stamp spending, they would say the bill “added” trillions in spending and debt because they are counting ALL the projected federal spending that exists entirely outside the scope of this legislation, which is of course preposterous. The only funding in the bill is for the President’s border and defense priorities, while enacting a net spending cut of over 1.6 TRILLION dollars.
The bill has two fiscal components: a massive tax cut and a massive spending cut.”
I saw Miller’s defense yesterday. Like you, I want to believe him, BUT if there is no funding in this bill, why even have it at all. Why have a fight over something that does nothing? I know I am a simpleton, but an educated simpleton. Why have this fight over something that has no funding effect? As a friend has told me often, my dog can whip that skunk, but I don’t want him in that fight.
If the bill does nothing, other than give politicians fuel for disagreements, why must we endure the exercise?
Please help this simpleton out with understanding the necessity of the bill if it does nothing.
Gwjack
“Stephen Miller...A reconciliation bill...limited by senate rules”
The reconciliation route is insufficient.
Put the DOGE and other indicated cuts in the bill and have Democrats on record again and again as opposing tax cut continuation and the tip/overtime/SS tax reductions.
[Note: I dislike tax favoritism such as the tip/overtime/SS tax reductions.]
Don’t confuse the pearl clutching, crystal ball readers on FR with facts.
Hurts their 4 IQ points.