Will the Big Ugly Bill Cost the GOP the Senate?

The Republicans just passed one of the least popular, most odious pieces of legislation in history

This morning, the United States Senate passed one of the cruelest, most immoral, stupidest, and politically unpopular pieces of legislation in the country’s nearly 250-year history. Every Democrat voted against it, and all but 3 Republicans voted for it. Somehow, the supposedly less radical Senate Republicans took a terrible bill and made it even worse. The legislative process was an abomination. No one has read the bill text, and passage involved a series of legislative bribes to get people like the once-honorable Lisa Murkowski to sell out her values and her country

The bill now heads to the House, where Republicans are under tremendous pressure to pass it before Donald Trump’s self-imposed—and completely arbitrary—July 4th deadline.

Congress has done a lot of dumb shit over the years, but this bill—if and when it becomes law—might just be the dumbest. The whole process of passing it has been surreal and serves as a metaphor for the Trump-era Republican Party. No one is asking for it. Other than preventing a tax increase, it doesn’t achieve a single long-standing conservative policy goal. No one campaigned on these ideas, and the public is screaming that they hate the bill. It’s bad policy, worse politics—and yet Republicans march onward because Donald Trump wants a “win.” Not a substantive win. Not even a political win. Just a win for the sake of a win. That’s the only rationale. There’s no further consideration for why this bill should be passed or what happens when it does. They do it because Trump wants it—even though he has no idea why he wants it, or what’s in it.

In the past, passage of bills this destructive and unpopular has triggered political earthquakes that reshaped the map. At this moment, Democrats are probably slight favorites to take the House, but the Senate has been considered just out of reach. Will the passage of this monstrosity put the Senate firmly in play?

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What’s in the Bill?

Before we get to the political implications, it’s worth looking at what’s actually in this terrible bill—and what it does.

This bill doesn’t solve a single pressing policy problem; in fact, it makes all of them worse. It’s the largest transfer of wealth from the poor to the rich in U.S. history. A recession becomes more likely, interest rates are less likely to fall, the debt skyrockets, and millions will lose health care and food assistance to fund tax cuts for billionaires.