By Dr. E. Faye Williams
(Trice Edney Wire)–Why would anyone who cares about the least of God’s people call the budget bill that just passed the big beautiful bill? Those who voted for it have a peculiar sense of the word beauty.
We have 100 U.S.Senators who spent a lot of time debating a bill they were sent over from the House of Representatives—with instructions to pass this bill by July 4th. The irony of that instruction was that July 4th is Independence Day. On the final vote only two Republicans had the courage to be independent!
After a lot of threats were issued about what would happen to them if they didn’t do what the man in the White House told them to do, they would have a problem. A few kept declaring they didn’t like one thing or another in the bill, but they continued voting for it to the very end even as they twisted and turned and talked about what was wrong with it.
Many were reminded often how the bill would hurt their constituents, but even the complainers were too afraid to vote in the best interest of their constituents. They were more afraid of what the president would do than they cared about what their constituents would do when they really found out what was in the bill!
I’m talking about big bad Republicans who bowed down to the threats they knew they faced if they didn’t vote as they were told to do. After hours of hearing why they shouldn’t, they finally passed the budget bill and sent it to the White House.
This is the largest wealth transfer in history from poor and working-class people to millionaires and billionaires without shame!
It will throw more than 16 million people off health insurance, cut1 trillion $ from Medicaid, shuttering many nursing homes and rural hospitals, take nutrition help away from hungry kids and families who need it, eliminate hundreds of thousands of clean energy jobs while jeopardizing billions of dollars in wind and solar energy investments, cut Pell Grants for millions of students pursuing higher education and needing the grant without which they may either have to forego their studies or prolong the time before they can complete them -–if ever.
This big beautiful bill is all for the pleasure of serving the wealthy — many of whom could well have lived forever on their savings! It was proof of what a song we’ve too often heard—“Them That’s Got Shall Get.”
Republicans were too willing to reward the already ultra-wealthy and dump billions of dollars into ICE’s secret police to further terrorize certain people just trying to find any kind of honest work to educate their children and feed their families. Republicans give new meaning to “Family Values” by so many of their actions, including voting for this so called big beautiful bill they were told to support. Their instructions were “Do It or Else” so they did it. By the next election, let us pray they will be replaced by officials who deserve to be in the House and Senate to serve the people they promised to represent.
Taking the final vote, they told their constituents that it’s okay to add 4 trillion $ to the national debt so long as that money is being funneled to the wealthy and our increasingly militarized police state — but forget about helping their less fortunate constituents!
They planned things so their poor constituents won’t get a clear picture of how they’ve been deceived until it’s too late. Many cuts won’t take effect until AFTER the 2026 midterm elections. Republicans will be back again to make grand promises and blame Democrats for all that went wrong.
It’s up to us to remind our Republican neighbors what really happened and how it will happen again if they continue with amnesia as to which Party actually works for them.
