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America Worst, Codified: Trump’s Horrific, Harmful, Horrendous Bill and Our Future
We who believe in justice, equality, diversity, love, sustainability, peace, and so much more, are still here, and we can still, ultimately, win.
Jul 03, 2025
America Worst has arrived in full, right on time for July 4. Cue the war-mimicking fireworks, that ultra-American metaphor for this country’s “virtual” wars and endless militarism. Years in the making, decades of trickle-down, warmongering, and fearmongering insanity have now been codified and more deeply entrenched than ever with President Donald Trump’s huge, horrific, horrendous bill passing the House July 3.
As Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) gaveled in the final results, Republicans chanted “USA, USA, USA” on the House floor, in a truly sickening, pathetic display. They know better: They know they just passed massive tax breaks for the rich at everyone else’s expense, while adding $3.3 TRILLION in debt and slashing healthcare and Medicaid access. They know.
All Americans who are not rich should be angry—very angry. It may take a year or two for much of the pain and suffering to arrive, but be assured, it’s coming (packaged cynically to set in just after the 2026 midterms). Much of the harm will come to Trump voters themselves, working-class and poor people in rural areas that can least afford yet more gutting of already-meager healthcare access. Not to mention the millions who will lose food assistance.
The wreckage and suffering and pain caused by this bill is now fully on the Republicans. They own this disaster entirely.
The pain and hardship and suffering will come. Many Trump voters will lose healthcare; lose food assistance; get less workplace safety and rights on the job; will find their local rivers and streams, their air and drinking water, more polluted and less healthy. Many Trump voters will find far longer wait times—if they’re “lucky”—at local clinics and hospitals due to spending and staffing cuts.
Budgets are indeed moral documents and statements—or, in this case, profoundly immoral and deeply depraved ones. This sickening, sad, shameful bill delivers the ultimate reverse Robin Hood, cutting Medicaid (health insurance for low-income and disabled Americans) by more than $1 trillion over 10 years, cutting off health insurance to about 12 million Americans, and raiding hundreds of billions of dollars from food assistance for low-income Americans.
Lest we forget, this bill decimates our ecological future by gutting renewable energy supports while expanding yet more species-destroying fossil fuels. This less-heralded injury to us all could be the ultimate imperilment, at precisely the time we need the opposite.
All of this is like Reagan redux, along with Trump’s Nixonian vile viciousness and corruption—all on steroids. Actually, Trump and his bill are worse than all of that.
Trump’s disgusting, despicable, disastrous bill could of course ignite a Blue Wave in 2026 and could badly backfire on Republicans. And we can and should work for that, to at least diminish the harm and destruction Trump is causing.
In this razor-close vote battle on Trump’s repugnant, regrettable, regressive bill, the Democrats stayed unified and held strong in their ranks. Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.) put on an admirable show, breaking the House record with an eight-hour, 44-minute speech to stall things—but, like Sen. Cory Booker’s (D-N.J.) impressive marathon in the Senate some months ago, it was a show, a performance without concrete impact or consequences.
I beg of you, please, do not count on the Democrats, or the Democratic Party, to rescue us or salve the wide-open gaping wounds of America Worst. I know from extensive firsthand experience just how deeply disappointing and inadequate the less-evil, slower-road-to-hell party is. (And yes, I still will fight for Democrats to win, until we get a serious real alternative, because real human lives are at stake and less harm is still less harm.)
With everything on the line, and with a real chance at defeating Trump’s grotesque, galling, grim bill, the Democrats came up woefully short—not on the vote itself, but in organizing their members to prevent this nightmare. The party failed to organize and promote massive phone banks and other actions to mobilize swing-district voters to pressure their representatives against the bill.
This is a critical moment for us to show ourselves, and the world, this hateful, horrendous, harmful bill is not who we are.
I was astounded to find that the Democratic Party (nationally and in California) failed to put serious resources into the one thing that could have prevented this disaster—mass phone banking in the critical districts where it was most needed. There were some efforts, mostly from progressive and liberal groups, mostly to call one’s own reps. I personally urged the party repeatedly to deploy huge phone banks targeting these swing votes, yet there was shockingly little of it. The national and California Democratic Party social media pages offered no opportunities for this critical action to take place. I checked every day and saw no phone banks.
Finally, I called and messaged the California Democratic Party repeatedly, and finally got a call back from an excellent, overworked, dedicated organizer, who emailed me a link to a phone bank calling voters in swing districts here. That is what it took for me, a highly active, involved, and experienced activist, to get plugged in. I immediately shared the phone bank links widely. None of the California Democratic Party social media pages offered the link. Astounding and bizarre.
How can this be? I checked numerous major labor union social media pages and again found no opportunities to affect swing districts. Just a couple posts here and there to call your own rep. How can this possibly be, with everything on the line? Yes, the big unions did protest, and did have some phone banks here and there—but where was the massive, coordinated nationwide push to apply maximal pressure on those potential swing votes to defeat this outrageously awful bill?
With this atrocious legislation, Immigration and Customs Enforcement raids will expand and intensify even more, sending yet more terror into immigrant communities nationwide, all while racially profiling Black and Brown people, and often detaining and deporting people to viciously dangerous places, putting their lives in danger. How profoundly and deeply cruel and inhumane and rotten. All of this will get worse and will require even stronger resistance.
America Worst is here, folks. Trump is destroying this country before our eyes. But we who believe in justice, equality, diversity, love, sustainability, peace, and so much more, are still here, and we can still, ultimately, win. We all must rise up and resist. We all must do everything we can, and do it far better, in massive, coordinated fashion. We must build toward a real, labor-and-community-centered General Strike. We must continue to stop every bad, rotten, destructive thing Trump does. We must continue building genuine alternatives on and in the ground, in our communities.
Amid this America Worst moment, let’s remember—Trump’s terrible, tragic, trauma-inducing bill does not represent us. Barely half of Congress passed a measure by a president who didn’t even win a popular vote majority (and narrowly won those swing states). This bill is not us. It is the rich enriching the rich, yet again, at our expense. We are far, far better than this. Amid all this America Worst harm and destruction, this is a critical moment for us to show ourselves, and the world, this hateful, horrendous, harmful bill is not who we are.
The wreckage and suffering and pain caused by this bill is now fully on the Republicans. They own this disaster entirely. But if we all rise up, build stronger movements of resistance, and real political alternatives, we can still own the future.
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Trump’s Big Ugly Bill Is Fascism in Writing
It establishes an anti-immigrant police state in America, replete with a standing army of ICE agents and a gulag of detention facilities, and it was passed by a narrow margin despite popular opinion.
Jul 03, 2025
President Donald Trump’s 940-page Big Ugly Bill was passed today by the House and is now on the way to the White House for Trump’s signature.
It is a disgrace. It takes more than $1 trillion out of Medicaid—leaving about 12 million Americans without insurance by 2034—and slashes Food Stamps, all to give a giant tax cut to wealthy Americans.
It establishes an anti-immigrant police state in America, replete with a standing army of Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents and a gulag of detention facilities that will transform ICE into the most heavily funded law enforcement agency in the government.
The best analogy isn’t to Lyndon Johnson. It’s to the “strongmen” of the 1930s—Hitler, Stalin, Mussolini, and Franco.
It will increase the already-bloated deficit by $3.4 trillion.
It’s also disgraceful because of how it came to be.
Trump was elected with only a plurality of American voters, not a majority. He eked out his win by a margin of only 1.5%.
His Big Ugly Bill squeaked by in the Senate by one vote, supplied by Vice President JD Vance, and by just two votes in the House. No Democrat in either chamber voted for it.
Polls show most Americans oppose it.
It was passed nevertheless—within an artificial deadline set by Trump—because of Trump’s total grip on the Republican Party.
Republican lawmakers feared that Trump would go after defectors with public attacks or endorsements of primary challengers.
They also feared withering blowback from conservative media, “MAGA” diehards, and Trump himself on social media.
After North Carolina Sen. Thom Tillis announced his opposition to the bill, Trump posted on Truth Social, “Tillis is a talker and complainer, NOT A DOER! He’s even worse than Rand ‘Fauci’ Paul!”
Then Trump pledged to back a primary challenger to Tillis, and Tillis announced he would not seek reelection. Trump called that “good news,” and threatened primary challenges against other Republican fiscal conservatives standing in the way of the bill’s passage.
Other presidents in my lifetime have been able to summon majorities of lawmakers for unpopular causes—I think of Lyndon Johnson and the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965—but none with the retributive threats, social media fury, and potentially violent base of supporters that Trump is now wielding.
Needless to say, the Civil Rights and Voting Rights Acts made America more inclusive. Trump’s Big Ugly Bill makes America crueler.
The best analogy isn’t to Lyndon Johnson. It’s to the “strongmen” of the 1930s—Hitler, Stalin, Mussolini, and Franco.
That such a regressive, dangerous, gargantuan, and unpopular piece of legislation could get through Congress shows how far Trump has dragged America into modern fascism.
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With Its ‘Big Betrayal Bill,’ the GOP Is Waging War Against Working Class Americans
While Republicans prioritize tax breaks for billionaires, they’re simultaneously stripping away basic healthcare and support systems from those who need them most.
Jul 02, 2025
With U.S. President Donald Trump’s July 4 deadline looming, Senate Republicans just sold out working class families by passing Trump’s “Big Beautiful Bill”—all to please their billionaire backers. Inside this devastating bill are a host of tax cuts for the ultra-wealthy, paid for with cuts to Medicaid, SNAP, and other essential programs. It would also effectively eliminate the middle class in America as we know it.
To Republicans, and even some Democrats, in Congress these programs are just a line item on a budget. To myself, communities of color, and millions of Americans at risk, they are the difference between having healthcare and living in fear of sickness or injury because we couldn’t afford the care we needed to survive.
When I gave birth to my first child, I lost Medicaid coverage not long after she was born. This meant that in the critical months of my child’s early life, I was not able to see a doctor if something went wrong. It wasn’t until I found a job that offered me healthcare that this changed. In the wealthiest nation in the world, tying critical moments of need in someone’s life, such as postpartum care, to their employment status is unconscionable. Medicaid coverage has since expanded to cover postpartum care for a longer period of time, but this bill would be taking a massive step backward from ensuring all people have access to the care they need.
The GOP has made one thing clear: If they are left in charge, working class families will always come last.
Medicaid covers 41% of all births and nearly half of children with special healthcare needs. The cuts proposed in the newest version of the bill that Republican Senators just passed will push mothers out of postpartum care, shut down rural hospitals, and leave families uninsured. That pain will hardly go unnoticed by people in blue and red states alike, and leaders who support these cuts put the lives of their constituents, as well as their own political futures, at risk. Mothering Justice is committed to fighting against anyone who might support this horrendous bill—regardless of party.
If passed into law, this bill would cut over $1 trillion from Medicaid—the largest cut to Medicaid in history. That is $1 trillion that has been going to healthcare for America’ most vulnerable families sacrificed for the sake of tax cuts for billionaires. In Michigan alone, the Citizen’s Research Council of Michigan estimates that over 200,000 people will lose direct insurance coverage, and the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office estimates nearly 12 million Americans will lose their coverage over the next decade. Even those with private insurance could lose access to services when hospitals and providers struggle to stay open following cuts to Medicaid. The results are not just devastating, they’re catastrophic.
Health insurance isn’t the only program on the Republicans’ chopping block. SNAP keeps 4.5 million young children fed, and the proposed cuts will deepen food insecurity, especially in Black and Latino households already facing hunger at 2-3 times the national rate. In Michigan alone, SNAP cuts would create a $467 million hole in our economy. If this bill goes through, Trump will still accept luxury planes and lawmakers will still fly in private jets paid for with foreign money, but children will lose access to pediatric care and families will lose their only grocery options, deepening poverty in this country instead of fighting it.
Also buried in the “big, beautiful bill” are work requirements and red tape that deny qualified applicants access to essential programs. Historically, when work requirements for Medicaid recipients have been implemented at the state level, many working recipients lose their insurance due to the administrative hurdles of proving their employment. Republicans’ proposals would bury families in paperwork and procedural hurdles that disproportionately harm single moms, people with disabilities, and those without internet or stable housing. They are not efficiency measures—they are systemic tools of exclusion.
And cuts to SNAP and Medicaid don’t just hurt the people who rely on the program to feed their families. Small businesses, grocers, and local economies rely on SNAP dollars to thrive and support the community. The proposed changes will likely raise costs for states and taxpayers around the country, all for the sake of lining billionaire’s pockets. Under the guise of reducing federal spending, the bill’s proposal burdens states with millions of additional, unnecessary administrative costs, forcing state governments to allocate funds to consulting fees and enforcement of work requirements rather than healthcare.
While Republicans prioritize tax breaks for billionaires, they’re simultaneously stripping away basic healthcare and support systems from those who need them most. Trump’s “Big Beautiful Bill” should actually be called the “Big Betrayal Bill”—because if it’s passed into law the wealth gap in this country will widen to astronomical levels. Mothers of color and working families across the country did not elect their representatives to protect the ultra-wealthy. The GOP has made one thing clear: If they are left in charge, working class families will always come last.
Now, as the bill goes back to the House, Mothering Justice is committed to fighting against anyone who might support this horrendous bill—regardless of party. Now is the time to call your member of Congress and let them know you will not stand for the federal government stealing money from working class families. Tell those we elected to power that they must use every tool at their disposal to stop this bill from being passed into law.
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