The Medicaid cuts in the One Big Beautiful Bill Act are a good move made by the wrong people at the wrong time.
Entitlements are certainly a huge problem for the American federal government, accounting for approximately 46% of the federal budget, according to the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities. Since the year 2000, Medicaid programs have cost the American taxpayer roughly $14.6 trillion adjusted for inflation. Conservatives should confront the waste, fraud, and abuse in these programs, but only within an overall plan to balance the whole budget.
The One Big Beautiful Bill Act is estimated to add $4.1 trillion to the federal deficit over the next decade, according to the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget, by making the 2017 Jobs Act tax cuts permanent and adding billions to defense and immigration budgets.
Medicaid has cost nearly $15 trillion since 2000. However, the Republican Party has authorized that same amount across pandemic relief aid ($3.6 trillion), foreign aid ($1.2 trillion), and wars in the Middle East ($10 trillion). Clearly, they have no qualms about that level of spending.
Since President Donald Trump’s victory in 2016, the Republican base has shifted against interventionist foreign policies. A Pew Research poll from May found that more than two-thirds of Republican voters want the federal government to “pay less attention to problems overseas and concentrate on problems here at home.” A FabrizioWard poll from April showed that 49% of Trump voters were opposed to Medicaid cuts, as opposed to 39% in support.
Republicans shouldn’t base their policies on public opinion, but younger voters, especially conservatives, are turning against an American foreign policy that aims to regulate global affairs. Voters under 25 are much more passionate about having a government whose public image and bent is to benefit the American people domestically. Republicans will not continue to win elections by cutting taxes and entitlements without making substantial change to foreign-policy-directed spending.
Conservatism that seeks to cut domestic spending must first look to wasteful foreign spending that does not keep us safe and has only destabilized an entire region of the world. The message that Republicans send to the American people when they authorize billions more in aid to Ukraine and Israel while cutting healthcare for American citizens is not that they care about balancing the budget or prioritizing federal spending to benefit Americans.
If Republicans ignore changing opinions among younger voters, they will cede ground to left-wing voices that advocate for increased domestic and foreign spending. Republicans will lose the ability to balance the budget while Democrats will have the votes to advance heavy entitlement spending.
By prioritizing foreign spending cuts, Republicans can win elections, cut spending, and then make the argument for entitlement cuts.
The future of the post-Trump Republican party will be decided in the 2028 election. If they want to build on the successes of the Make America Great Again movement, Republicans must prioritize Americans.
