Fact-checking falsehoods about Trump's ‘Big Beautiful Bill’ and taxes, deficit, Medicaid

Republican leaders tout President Donald Trump’s "One Big Beautiful Bill" as a way to prevent a 68% tax increase, rein in the deficit and maintain current levels of food assistance for low-income people.

The trouble: All of those supposed selling points lack factual basis. 

The tax and spending legislation — which passed the House on May 22 — could receive a Senate vote this week and can be passed by a simple majority. Trump has said he wants it on his desk by July 4, directing senators in a June 24 Truth Social post to "lock yourself in a room if you must."

With so many Trump priorities packed into the bill, politicians and social media users have commented at length about elements of the bill. Here are some of their false and misleading statements.

Trump: If the "Big, Beautiful" tax and spending bill doesn’t pass, "there will be a 68% tax increase." June 5, Truth Social post

False.

Independent analyses of the bill — which would extend 2017 tax cuts that are slated to expire later this year — found that Trump’s estimate is almost 10 times bigger than the expected increase would be if the cuts expire.

The Urban Institute-Brookings Institution Tax Policy Center, a nonpartisan think tank, estimated, on average, that Americans’ taxes would rise by about 7.5% if the 2017 tax cuts fully expired. 

The center-right Tax Foundation predicted a similar increase to the Tax Policy Center both for the House-passed version and the legislation being considered in the Senate, said Garrett Watson, the Tax Foundation’s director of policy analysis. 

Trump: In the House bill, "we’re not changing Medicaid," only cutting "waste, fraud and abuse." May 20, remarks to reporters

False.

Republicans tout the bill’s provisions that tighten work requirements and make it harder for states to cover immigrants in the U.S. illegally using state funds. But those provisions are ideological — they aren’t fraud.

And although the legislation includes provisions that can improve how easily the government detects beneficiaries who don’t meet Medicaid’s eligibility standards, many of the bill’s other changes go beyond cutting waste, fraud and abuse in Medicaid. 

For instance, it would ban payments to nonprofits such as Planned Parenthood, which is an ideologically driven position. Other changes aim to cut the federal government’s costs, including the imposition of copays and a shorter window for retroactive coverage. 

Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt.: "Republicans just unveiled their ‘big, beautiful bill,’ which will take Medicaid & health insurance away from 13.7 million Americans." May 12, X post

Half True. 

Millions of people are projected to lose Medicaid and health insurance, but Sanders counted factors beyond what was in the draft of the bill.

The House-passed version of the bill wasn’t finalized when we initially fact-checked Sanders in May. But the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office estimated in early June that the legislation itself would result in 10.9 million people losing health insurance by 2034, and that another 5.1 million would lose insurance from the scheduled expiration of an expanded premium tax credit and marketplace rule. There is no new CBO estimate on the Senate bill.

White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt: Trump’s tax and spending bill "does not add to the deficit." May 19, White House briefing

False.

On June 4, the CBO released its conventional cost estimate, which found the legislation would increase the deficit by $2.4 trillion from 2025 to 2034. The agency’s June 17 "dynamic estimate," which accounts for potential economic effects from enacting the bill, estimated that deficits would increase by even more — almost $2.8 trillion over the same decade. 

The price tag would rise to $3.4 trillion after factoring in the added interest required to fund the provisions in the legislation. 

The White House says CBO’s analysis was "based on a false assumption that President Trump’s 2017 tax cuts will expire," and that once this is factored in, there will be "zero impact on the deficit." 

However, independent analyses — such as from the Penn-Wharton Budget Model, the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget and Moody’s — have consistently rejected this argument. Even when accounting for expected economic growth, no independent analysis projects the overall federal debt to shrink over the next 10 years after the bill’s passage.

House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La.: "We are not cutting" the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program. May 25, CBS’ "Face the Nation"

False.

Johnson said lawmakers were cutting fraud, waste and abuse, but the legislation would go further than that. Analyses by the CBO, the Urban Institute and the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities show that millions of people could be removed from SNAP if the bill is enacted.

American Action Network: The Republican tax and spending bill will provide a "tax cut for Social Security recipients." June 4 ad

Half True.

The House version of the bill included an additional $4,000 tax deduction for people 65 and older, although it includes an income limit. The Senate version proposed a $6,000 tax deduction. But the deductions would not apply to all Social Security recipients. It would exclude retired workers between ages 62 and 64, retired workers’ dependents, survivors of deceased workers and disabled workers and their dependents.

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