Democrats are continuing to criticize the so-called “big, beautiful bill” that slashes social services and extends tax cuts passed during President Trump’s first term.
Maintaining that the GOP’s domestic package will have ugly consequences for New Yorkers, the state’s Democrats are continuing to voice sharp criticisms.
On a Thursday Zoom call with reporters, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer criticized the bill for its severe cuts to clean-energy incentives, which he says could eliminate tax credits, raise New Yorkers' electricity bills by hundreds of dollars annually and lead to job losses, cratering the state's clean energy economy.
"The House bill, in just decimating the clean energy credits, would raise your costs, whether you're a homeowner or a small business for energy, it will cause a loss of 20,000 jobs in New York state to start with, and many other ancillary jobs, and would give China a user advantage that is not big and beautiful, that's big, but it's ugly," said Schumer, who
noted the bill also slashes food assistance and makes the deepest cut to Medicaid in history.
At his office in Albany on Wednesday, Capital Region Congressman Paul Tonko said along with cuts to Medicaid and Medicare, more than 26,000 people in the 20th district could lose their healthcare if the Senate approves the package.
"Each of us as members of that committee on the Democratic side searched out and received plentiful amounts of anecdotal evidence of what it would mean, [to] individuals in wheelchairs, individuals who, you know we're talking about children, to the disabled, to the seniors, most senior amongst us, across the demographics, there were people expressing their need to have these dollars," Tonko said.
A member of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, which oversees Medicaid spending, Tonko said Republicans rebuked attempts by Democrats to mitigate hundreds of billions of dollars of cuts to the program.
"For them, it was this document that was going to be grand and big and beautiful and accomplish all these cuts and reduce government," said Tonko. "But what you're doing is undoing access to health care coverage. You're undoing access to food assistance programs. And, you know, I think there's a call here for a bipartisan strategy. There was no there was no effort made by the majority to reach across the aisle and work with Democrats to come up with a fair and acceptable plan."
Responding to a request for comment, 17th district Republican Congressman Mike Lawler's office emailed a statement that says in part, "Tonko is spreading blatant falsehoods about the House reconciliation bill, which does nothing to cut Medicare."
Massachusetts Congressman Richard Neal, a Democrat from the 1st district, says he's hopeful Senators will come to a different conclusion than those in the House, which passed its version of the bill earlier this month.
"Some of that might be buffered by the fact that many of them might not be in a reelect cycle over there, so that will give them greater opportunity for deliberation," Neal said. "I think many of them have already said that this proposal that's coming from the House Republicans has very little chance of passing the US Senate. And I think that it's very important to understand that if you're a Republican senator from Missouri, one out of three people in your state derives a Medicaid benefit. In West Virginia, I think it's closer to 40% and they have Republican senators."
In a statement, a spokesperson for North Country Congresswoman Elise Stefanik of the 21st district says "There are no cuts to Medicaid, and the fact is that the bill actually increases Medicaid by eliminating billions in waste, fraud and abuse."
