Sen. Josh Hawley never explicitly said he’d oppose his party’s domestic policy megabill — the inaptly named One Big Beautiful Bill Act — but the Missouri Republican has spent the last several weeks telling GOP leaders that he had real concerns with the party’s proposed Medicaid cuts. It’s why he ended up on lists of members who put the legislation’s future at risk.
The scuttlebutt proved unnecessary: On Saturday, Hawley said he’s “going to vote yes on this bill,” though he apparently announced his intention with some reservations. The GOP senator told NBC News:
This has been an unhappy episode here in Congress, this effort to cut Medicaid. And I think, frankly, my party needs to do some soul-searching. If you want to be a working-class party, you’ve got to deliver for working-class people. You cannot take away health care from working people. And unless this is changed going forward, that is what will happen in coming years. So I’m going to do everything I can to stop that.
Those comments coincided with a related quote that Hawley also gave to NBC News. “We can’t be cutting health care for working people and for poor people in order to constantly give special tax treatment to corporations and other entities,” the Missouri Republican said. He added, “The party has a lot of thinking to do.”
Commenting on a video clip of the GOP senator’s comments, Democratic Sen. Brian Schatz of Hawaii responded online, “I think what makes this video so compelling is that he’s very convincing, but he couldn’t convince himself.”
It’s hard to blame Schatz for mocking his Republican colleague. Hawley believes his party has “some soul-searching” and “a lot of thinking” to do, but the GOP has already gone through that process, come to terms with its values and priorities, and it’s decided to cut over $1 trillion from the Medicaid program.
And Hawley has decided to go along with this.
The Republican similarly said, “You cannot take away health care from working people,” while agreeing to vote to take away health care from working people. He doesn’t believing in cutting health care for struggling families in order to “give special tax treatment to corporations,” but he’s decided to cut health care for struggling families in order to give special tax treatment to corporations. Hawley is going to do “everything” he can “to stop” these Medicaid cuts, except vote against the bill, which would actually stop the cuts.
I’m mindful that there might seem to be a difference between Republicans who are gleeful about cutting Medicaid and those who seem reluctant to cut Medicaid, but the practical effects for struggling families are the same: Americans poised to go without health coverage won’t be able to pay their bills with Hawley’s chagrin.
