“A Big, Ugly, Destructive, Deadly Bill”: Bishop William Barber Slams Bill Cutting Medicaid, Medicare

AMY GOODMAN: President Trump made a rare visit to Capitol Hill to push House Republicans to support a sweeping budget bill that gives massive tax breaks to the rich while slashing spending for Medicaid, food stamps and subsidies for clean energy. One estimate shows nearly 14 million people could lose health coverage. A new analysis by the Congressional Budget Office says the bill will also trigger $535 billion in Medicare cuts.

Negotiations on the bill continued through the night as a group of Republicans are pushing for even bigger spending cuts, with blue state Republicans seeking larger tax breaks by increasing the deduction on state and local taxes.

Standing next to House Speaker Mike Johnson, President Trump spoke to the press on Tuesday during his visit to Capitol Hill.

PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: This is the greatest bill that will ever — I think it’s the most important bill this country, just about, has ever done, in terms of size and scope. That’s why we call it the great, big, beautiful deal. I mean, it really is. The bill is — I think it’s going to be one of the most important. It’s the biggest tax reduction in history, biggest regulation reduction in history, incredible for Medicaid, for Medicare.

AMY GOODMAN: During a House hearing early this morning, Democratic Congressmember Brendan Boyle outlined how the bill could trigger more than a half a trillion dollars in Medicare cuts.

REP. BRENDAN BOYLE: This is really the breaking news, because when the Budget Committee kicked off this process approximately three months ago, there was a commitment by President Trump that there would be no Medicare cuts in this piece of legislation. And indeed, over the last several months, there has been no discussion of Medicare at all. There has been of Medicaid, but not of Medicare. Well, here we are tonight, because — as you explained, because of the size of the deficits, because of the PAYGO, or Pay-As-You-Go Act, that would trigger sequestration of Medicare, and it would total over $500 billion. The official figure that CBO confirms is $535 billion in cuts to Medicare.

AMY GOODMAN: We’re now joined by Bishop William Barber, president of Repairers of the Breach, founding director of the Center for Public Theology and Public Policy at Yale Divinity School, also national co-chair of the Poor People’s Campaign and co-author of the book White Poverty: How Exposing Myths About Race and Class Can Reconstruct American Democracy.

Bishop Barber, you’ve twice been arrested recently on Capitol Hill during Moral Mondays protests against the budget bill. Talk about why.

BISHOP WILLIAM BARBER II: Thank you so much, Amy.

And I was talking to Joan Baez about this the other day, about how ugly the times are, and yet how we must stand. And we’ve got to sharpen our language. I was arrested with others, and we were arrested in the rotunda for simply praying about the ugliness of this bill. And people who represent thousands, hundreds of thousands of religious congregants were arrested. And we’re going back June 2nd for a Mass Moral Monday, sponsored by Repairers of the Breach and 20 other partners, because we have to stand up in this moment.

This is a big, ugly, destructive, deadly bill. And we have to start talking about it in those terms. It’s not just about tax cuts to the wealthy. It is about that, but it is about death-dealing and destruction to the poor and the elderly and the youth of our country, regardless of what their color is. In fact, one of the things we need to be doing is disaggregating what will happen in these states and in various communities, whether you’re in Appalachia or you’re in Alabama. They lie and say that this is about cutting fraud, and it really is not. It is about cutting legitimate and life-giving and necessary programs that we fought for for years.

Real quickly, Amy, I want your listeners to understand, when we talk about cutting Medicaid, we’re talking about primarily low-income individuals of all races, creeds and colors, families, children, pregnant women and elderly people and people with disabilities. Now we’re hearing $500 billion cuts to Medicare. We’re talking about persons who are 65 years or older. We’re talking about children who have kidney disease, life-ending kidney disease, and people who have Lou Gehrig’s disease. We know that for every a million people that are denied healthcare, some 2,500 people, some studies say, actually die. And we’re talking about a time when we’re already having 800 people dying a day from effects of poverty and low wages.

This is a big, bad, ugly, deadly, destructive bill. And it must be resisted everywhere, in the places of power, in our pulpits, in the streets. We must pray, put our bodies on the line, because what we’re talking about here is 13.7 million people could lose Medicare and their health insurance. We also know that there’s no way to do this kind of cutting without eventually also getting to Social Security. The numbers just will not work. We also know that Bannon has said, in a video that he did, that their goal is to control the $5 trillion budget, so they can control the $70-some trillion asset owned by the government. This is a massive takeover, a big, bad, ugly, destructive, deadly bill. Talking about 11 million children who will lose food stamps — people lose food stamps; 4 million of those are children. We’re talking about $6.5 billion investment in green energy being cut, being cut.

And they say that they are making these tax cuts to help society, but the very school that Trump often claims or brags about he attended, the Wharton School, has said that for low-income Americans, for poor and low-income people, the changes to the tax code in the House bill means they will have less annual income. They will lose an average of $1,035. But for the wealthiest people in this country, it says that they will get an average of $389,000-plus more per year.

This is a big, bad, ugly, deadly, destructive bill that will hurt poor people, will hurt low-wage people and, ultimately, will hurt America. And if they do it, they want to do it for 10 years. You’re going to see massive destruction in rural healthcare. You’re going to see, you know, these immoral cuts, where the rich have more, the poor and working people have less. And then they want to put more money, not only what they’re cutting, but another $350 billion into defense contractors and more money into deportation. So, basically, what they want to do is take this budget and codify the vision and the goals of Musk and the DOGE into this budget. And they want to do it, Amy, lastly, with a reconciliation process that means they only need 51 votes — not 60, but 51 votes.

Donald Trump has said one thing that is true: This is a great bill. But it’s not great in the sense of good. It is a great, big, bad, ugly, destructive, deadly, debilitating bill that will hurt Americans and poor and low-wage people for years and years to come, and could be the very undermining of our democracy, if we allow it to go forward.

JUAN GONZÁLEZ: Bishop Barber, in rural areas specifically, there has been reports of many hospitals that may be forced to close in rural communities as a result of cuts in federal funding. Can you talk about, in your areas of North Carolina and other rural areas, the direct impact that will result from this?

BISHOP WILLIAM BARBER II: Well, remember, COVID exposed a whole lot of problems with our health system. And so, we know that the states, for instance, that didn’t expand Medicaid, during COVID, many, many, many people died that didn’t have to die. And we saw the rate of death in poor and low-wage states, whether they were predominantly white or predominantly Black, were about the same level. It was gross. It was immoral. It was bad.

We also know that when — because states didn’t accept Medicaid expansion — and this bill would roll back a lot of Medicaid expansion, would roll back Medicaid, which is critical to keeping rural hospitals open. So, let me give you a story of what we’re going to see, what we have already seen. In North Carolina, for instance, when North Carolina refused to expand Medicaid, there’s a lady, young lady, with the name Portia. I met her. Portia was the first person to die in Belhaven, North Carolina, a rural community, after that hospital was closed, and because of the cuts and the denial of Medicaid expansion. They had a hospital, had had it 30, 40, 50 years. It could not survive. You know, she died in the parking lot, in the parking lot of a school, waiting on the helicopter to come. And the doctor said, if that hospital had been there, she would have probably lived, because she would have been able to get to care within what we call the golden hour. This bill goes forward, you’re going to hear more of that, more hospitals cut, more rural hospitals cut, more inner-city hospitals cut, more hospitals disabled from carrying out their duties to care for the people.

And I want to just drive home, Amy and Juan, that we’ve got to get folk to see how this is affecting lives. We have to start talking about this budget as a form of social and political murder, social and political deadliness, because they know. And the reason I use the word “murder” is because they know that it’s going to cause death. The studies are out there that tell what happens when you cut more and more healthcare, and yet they’re pushing through. And they’re pushing through in the middle of the night. They do not want to have this debate during the day, when people are up and they can see what’s going on. They’re doing it at night, because this is a great, big, bad, ugly, deadly, destructive budget bill.

JUAN GONZÁLEZ: And yet, Bishop Barber, there are some Republicans that are holding out support because they want even more cuts than the present bill that is being shepherded by Speaker Johnson. What is your response to how people should resist or deal with the maneuvers in Congress in these coming days?

BISHOP WILLIAM BARBER II: Budgets are moral documents. That’s why we’re calling on people to join us June the 2nd, on Monday, for a Mass Moral Monday right in front of the Supreme Court and in the Capitol. Clergy are coming in full vestments. We’re inviting clergy. Clergy are bringing impacted people and other advocates. We have to stand up everywhere and declare that this is not about Democrat or Republican, as we say, the 20-18, or left versus right. This is really about right versus wrong.

And this should be our total focus, because if you allow this with this budget, you dismantle the government. This is their attempt to so-called dismantle the state, the administrative state. But it’s deadly, and it’s destructive. And we have to call it a moral issue. And we have to put a face on who’s actually going to be hurt and what’s actually going to happen. I’m calling on every news agency, should be putting up maps of the United States and show where the cuts are going to be, so that folk can understand this is not going to affect people outside of your community, it’s going to affect your community.

Every Democratic congressperson, or if there’s a Republican that’s against it, should bring impacted people to the gallery. They should be walking through the congressional offices in the Capitol. Make the folk have to see who they will actually be hurting, whose lives they will be putting on the line.

This is gut check time for America. This is gut check time for the moral voices of this country. We cannot stand down in this moment. If this goes into effect, we’re talking about 10 years — 10 years — 10 years that this country could be hampered and hurt with what will happen with this budget. And it’s not just what they’re cutting, it’s what they’re funding. They’re cutting the programs that bring life. They’re funding programs that bring more death and more deportation and more destruction.

Either way you look at it, this is a great, big, ugly, deadly, bad, destructive, disabling bill, and we have to stand against it in every way. No one can be on the side, especially moral leaders, pastors and clergy, imams and rabbis, who pastor and care for the people, because we, particularly those in congregation lead, will bury the people, will have to be with the families whose lives will be cut short because of this great, big, ugly, deadly, destructive, debilitating bill that they’re trying to push through.

And lastly, Juan, I just —

AMY GOODMAN: We have 30 seconds, Bishop.

BISHOP WILLIAM BARBER II: — don’t know what’s in the mind — yeah, I don’t know what’s in the mind of people, that you get up in the morning — what kind of mythology has gotten a hold of your mind, that all you can figure out to do with power is how many people you can hurt, how many lives you can put at risk, how many lives you can destroy, how much bad policy. It is a sickness. And those of us who have not been bound by that sickness, it’s time that we have to stand up in this moment.

AMY GOODMAN: Bishop William Barber, president at Repairers of the Breach, founding director of the Center for Public Theology and Public Policy at Yale Divinity School, also national co-chair of the Poor People’s Campaign, thanks so much for being with us.