Jay Weber Show transcript 5-27-25
It’s good to see speaker Mike Johnson and other republicans ‘out there’ in the media, selling this reconciliation bill and setting the record straight on the so-called ‘cuts’ to Medicaid and food stamps.
They aren’t cute. They are reforms.
And yes, there are reforms that are going to cause some people to lose their free-bee Medicaid coverage, but those people are primarily in two categories: illegal aliens and able-bodied adults who-could work-but simply don’t want to.
There are no cuts to the funding of this entitlement program...and the reforms that they-are-making will only ‘slow the rate of this runaway program’...not cut it.
If we envision Medicaid as a balloon...thanks to both Obama and Biden expansion of Medicaid- we have been forcing too much air into this balloon.
If it was meant to be a program for the elderly and disabled and single mothers-it’s now a program for people who-should-be working and getting private insurance...and illegals...and all sorts of others.
The Medicaid balloon is always ‘expanding’...but it was on a slow and manageable expansion before Obamacare dumped millions more people on it. Then came covid and another ‘excuse’ for the left to massively expand the program-and they took it- to the point that -if Medicaid keeps expanding at the rate in which it’s going- the balloon will pop.
The program can only ‘take in’ so much expansion without exploding or going bankrupt. Congressional republicans are trying to reduce the flow of air...so the balloon doesn’t pop. That’s all they are doing.
And even then- they are making changes that many of us on the right consider ‘too minor’.These reforms don’t even go as far as they should- to really make the program more sustainable.
But- last week- we were saying: republicans must aggressively fight the left’s aggressive misinformation campaign- because it’s working. All sorts of Americans are falling for the lie that this reconciliation bill ‘cuts’ Medicaid. It doesn’t.
Listen to speaker Mike Johnson on CNN Friday.
"It‘s directly in line with what the president said. I‘ve said the same. We are not cutting Medicaid in this package. There‘s a lot of misinformation out there about this, Jake. The numbers of Americans who are affected are those that are entwined in our work to eliminate fraud, waste and abuse. And what I mean, what do I mean by that? You got more than 1.4 million illegal aliens on Medicaid. Medicaid is not intended for non-U.S. citizens. It‘s intended for the most vulnerable populations of Americans, which is pregnant women and young single mothers, the disabled, the elderly. They are protected in what we‘re doing because we‘re preserving the resources for those who need it most. You‘re talking about 4.8 million able bodied workers, young men, for example, who are on Medicaid and not working. They are choosing not to work when they can. That is called fraud. They are cheating the system. When you root out those kinds of abuses, you save the resources that are so desperately needed by the people who deserve it and need it most. That‘s what we‘re doing, and that‘s why this is a the morality of what we‘re doing here is precisely right, and it comports with all the public opinion polls. When people ask whether young men, for example, who are able bodied and have no dependents should be working, everybody says yes, and that‘s what our package does. So these estimates that you‘re hearing are accurate, but it‘s dealing with those numbers of people in the population. And that‘s going to make the preserve the program and strengthen it for those who need it most."
Bottom line: as Chuck Schumer and AOC moan and whine about 8-million Americans ‘losing’ the health insurance that-you- provide to them as taxpayers, remember they are all illegals and/or people who- should be working and could be working but refuse to.
And don’t give me the ‘they can’t find a job’ malarkey. There are about 7 to 10 million jobs currently unfilled in America- and anyone who wants a job can find one. Especially if it’s just ‘part time’ which is all this new change to Medicaid would require: that able bodied people with no dependents get off the couch and work 20 hours a week. Or go through job training. Or do volunteer work.
It could not be easier to meet the parameters of that requirement.
Meanwhile-this ‘big, beautiful’ reconciliation bill-which is literally what the republicans entitled it” one big, beautiful bill’....
Has moved to the senate.... with Johnson encouraging senators not to make too many changes to it.
We’ll talk about how our own senator, Ron Johnson, is leading the charge to slow the process down and go more systematically thru our programs to find more sizable and ‘real world’ cuts...in a moment here.
But- if it’s only Ron Johnson and rand Paul who really seem to want to ‘slow down and do it right’...they aren’t going to be very successful at it.
My guess is that many republican senators are only going to want a little tweak or two...rather than a larger rewrite.
The ‘political drift’ in Washington DC is to ‘get this done’...with president trump controlling those ‘winds.
And so, while I know Ron Johnson won’t back down on getting more cuts- if it’s just, kind of, him and rand, who are interested in that.... well, John Thune could afford to lose both of their votes.
The republicans have a three. Vote majority here? I believe?
And so- if Paul and Johnson are ‘hard no s” then it makes it more likely that john Thune will simply cave to a few- far more minor- demands that caucus squishes like Susan Collins and Lisa Murkowski want...and shore up their votes to pass it.
Get it?
If Ron Johnson and rand Paul want major cuts or they are a ‘no vote’...
But Susan Collins and Lisa Murkowski want something like planned parenthood refunded for their yes vote. Well, which holdouts does Thune ‘pay off’ to buy their vote?
That’s what we need to start watching for now- as this moves to the senate: what are the holdout senators demanding...and which are going to sound more reasonable or doable to john Thune and his leadership team?
It's why I’ve been saying Senator Johnson is right to push for more spending cuts but there could be a fine line between ‘winning more cuts for us’...and ‘getting nothing’ because senate leadership found him too difficult or unreasonable...and it was ‘just easier to buy off Susan Collins’...or whatever.
I think you will get it.
And as for ‘slowing down and doing it right?’ ...I just don’t see it happening.
Speaker Mike Johnson said over the weekend: please do not make major changes, because this must pass through the house a second time....and it won’t if you change it too dramatically.
Yes: this is a question of ‘what is possible’ versus ‘what is perfect’.
It’s basically a reference back to which is the smarter way to govern: pass something that isn’t perfect, but is 70 to 80 percent of what you want? Or hold out and get nothing, because it didn’t pass.
If this bill gets us most of the way toward closing the border and funding a mass deportation.... lowering energy and commodity prices...refunding the military at a better level, etc, etc.
Do you flush all those 70 to 80 percent wins down the toilet...because....by God, we didn’t get our deeper spending cuts.
Or because...by God, we didn’t get to defund planned parenthood.... Or whatever your pet issue is.
I’ve been saying that I don’t believe Senator Ron Johnson is-
And I’ll also say: I don’t believe that Senator Rand Paul is.
I believe both men realize what they are up against-and want to make the bill better if they can-
But both voted for the 2017 tax cuts, and both support the much larger effort being made here. I don’t see either of them pulling a ‘John McCain’ and digging in so hard that they kill off the bill-and republican’s chances in 2026 and 28....as they do so.
Both Ron and Rand have proven they are reasonable people-not grandstanders or stonewallers.
And they are not wrong when they say this bill could easily be better on ‘the spending’:
But everyone in both GOP caucuses knows they need to get this bill done.
John Thune’s group in the senate will probably leave it in-realizing it will force this process right back to ‘square one’ if they take it out of there. It took months and months to get a group of whiney, blue state republicans in the house to agree to ‘what’s in there’ to earn their vote.
It's all a frustrating balancing act.
photo credit: Getty Images
audio version of the segment here > We need the Big Budget Bill passed