U.S. Senator Ron Johnson (R-WI) is blasting President Donald Trump’s budget reconciliation legislation that passed the House early Thursday morning. Republican Senate Majority Leader John Thune will need to cobble together at least 50 votes to pass the massive bill that experts say will add trillions to the deficit, kick eight to thirteen million Americans off health care, gut Medicaid by $800 billion and Medicare by $500 billion, along with many other controversial provisions.

Fox News Senior Congressional Correspondent Chad Pergram reports that one MAGA Republican Senator, Wisconsin’s Ron Johnson, may be bucking the President and his “One Big Beautiful Bill Act.”

“Johnson calls the Big Beautiful Bill ‘completely unacceptable.’ When asked if he thought that would upset the President, Johnson replied ‘I couldn’t care less if he’s upset. I’m concerned about my children. My grandchildren,'” Pergram wrote.

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Senator Johnson’s issue appears to be not the millions who will lose health care, but the deficit. In other words, the bill, he believes, does not cut spending enough.

Ten days ago Johnson wrote a Wall Street Journal op-ed, and commented, “At a bare minimum, the ‘One Big Beautiful Bill’ shouldn’t INCREASE the annual deficit. With the meager spending reductions being discussed, I’m afraid it actually will.”

“In the House, President Trump can threaten a primary, and those guys want to keep their seats. I understand the pressure,” Johnson said, according to The Daily Beast. “Can’t pressure me that way.”

“I know everybody wants to go to Disney World, but we just can’t afford it,” he added.

Politico reported on Thursday that Senator Johnson “said there are sufficient votes to block the bill if his party doesn’t bend in his direction on spending reductions, including setting up a bicameral process for going ‘line by line’ to find a total of roughly $6.5 trillion in cuts over the coming decade.”

Johnson appears to have company.

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Several other Republican Senators have voiced distress over the House bill: Lisa Murkowski, Rick Scott, and Rand Paul, among others. Four “no” votes would mean the end of the bill, but it’s not clear that any of them will end up voting against the bill.

“I think there’s nothing conservative about having deficits of $2 trillion a year,” said Senator Paul.

“Most Republicans view Paul as a hard ‘no’ and acknowledge Johnson might be, as well,” Politico also reported.

“We have to get our fiscal house in order. We have no choice,” complained Senator Scott.

The concerns of some may be easily fixed. U.S. Senator Marsha Blackburn opposes a provision of the bill that bans states from imposing regulations on artificial intelligence.

Meanwhile, CNN notes that more than half a dozen Senate Republicans have voiced concerns, and NCRM currently counts even more who have expressed varying degrees of unease—yet this is still far from signaling they will oppose the bill.

Last week Senator Johnson explained his concerns on Trump’s bill.

Watch below or at this link.

Sen. Ron Johnson: “It’s a mistake to do one big beautiful bill. We’re actually going to add to the deficit… It’s not a big beautiful bill. That’s called rhetoric. It’s mislabelling. It’s false advertising.” pic.twitter.com/zOUvNCcEwv

— The Bulwark (@BulwarkOnline) May 15, 2025

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The Commissioner of the Food and Drug Administration, Marty Makary, came under strong criticism for his inconsistent remarks before a Senate Appropriations subcommittee after the accuracy of his claims related to terminated scientists and others was called into question by U.S. Senator John Ossoff (D-GA).

“You were asked on April 17th whether any of the personnel reductions had included personnel responsible for food safety or infant formula safety,” Senator Ossoff told Commissioner Makary. “You said, quote, ‘There were no cuts to scientists or reviewers or inspectors—absolutely none’. You were asked on April 23rd on CNN, and said, quote, ‘Again, there were no cuts to scientists or inspectors’.”

“But then just two days later, an HHS spokesperson confirmed that in fact, scientists had been fired, and that you were scrambling to rehire them,” Ossoff continued. “Did you, in fact, say on April 23d, there were no cuts to scientists or inspectors? Just before we get into the details, is that an accurate quote?”

“No scientific reviewer was cut as part of the reduction in force,” replied Commissioner Makary.

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“You said there were no cuts to scientists or inspectors. Didn’t you say that?” Ossoff pressed.

“My understanding,” Makary replied, “was that there were no cuts to the scientific staff, but specifically the scientific reviewers is what I was referring to.”

“But you said there were,” Ossoff responded.

A similar back and forth continued for several minutes, then, Senator Ossoff asked, “Had, in fact, scientists who study outbreaks of food related illnesses and the safety of infant formula been fired?”

“The reason it’s not accurate, Senator, is that people were not fired, they were scheduled for the reduction in force, and when that was before I got there. When I got there, we did an assessment, and so some of those individuals out of the 19,000 were restored,” Makary replied.

“Have all scientists responsible for food safety and infant formula safety, been rehired or reinstated?” Ossoff asked.

“Look, we have not reduced in force the scientific review staff. I know where you’re going with this,” Makary replied.

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“You said there were no cuts to scientists, and then the HHS spokesperson said, actually, there were cuts to scientists, and now we’re trying to rehire them. I mean, so it gives the impression you’re not sure about the personnel actions ongoing in your own agency,” said Ossoff.

After more back-and-forth, Ossoff wrapped it up: “You were very specific. You said there were no cuts to scientists. And then five days later, there were no cuts to scientists. Those are your direct quotes. There were no cuts to scientists, but there were cuts to scientists.”

Again, more back-and-forth and then Makary appeared to grow frustrated.

“I mean, this is the problem in government. Somebody has a fancy sounding name like, ‘Infant Formula Safety,’ and no one can ever touch them, even if they’re not doing their job.”

During his testimony, Dr. Makary also declared to another Senator, “By the way, America doesn’t want COVID boosters.”

And a third chastised him, saying: “You’re prepared for a question that I didn’t ask … I’m asking you what are you doing about bird flu! Just answer that. Please. Don’t give me a runaround about other stuff.”

Watch the video below or at this link.

“You said there were no cuts to scientists & then the HHS spokesperson said, ‘Actually, there were cuts to scientists & now we’re trying to rehire them.’ It gives the impression you’re not sure about the personnel actions in own agency & that’s an indication from your testimony… pic.twitter.com/xvewjCL4cn

— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) May 22, 2025

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During the House’s marathon markup of President Donald Trump’s historic budget bill, the Chairwoman of the powerful Rules Committee lashed out at Democrats for plainly describing the legislation’s sweeping consequences. Officially dubbed the “One Big, Beautiful Bill Act,” the measure narrowly passed in the early hours of Thursday by a 215–214 vote. It removes $800 billion in funding from Medicaid, would lead to $535 billion in cuts to Medicare, and is projected to cause an estimated 8.6 to 13.7 million Americans to lose their health care. It will also add $3 trillion to the federal deficit—fueled by tax breaks heavily tilted toward the wealthy and the nation’s first-ever $1 trillion defense budget.

“I am concerned about what has been said about this bill and what it’s going to do,” Chairwoman Virginia Foxx (R-NC) told the members of her committee Wednesday night. “The extreme comments that have been made about it, and how I believe that it is scaring people out there in the country unnecessarily.”

“The words I’ve heard, particularly today, are ‘cut,’ ‘rip,’ ‘gut,’ ‘kill,’ ‘cruel,’ ‘stealing food,’ ‘losing coverage,’ ‘jammed through,’ ‘biggest transfer of wealth from vulnerable to wealthy people,’ ‘irresponsible’.”

“That is not the way we ought to be talking about this bill.”

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Many appear to disagree.

MSNBC columnist Michael A. Cohen, just after the bill passed Thursday morning, wrote:  “What we do know about the legislation the GOP is calling the ‘One Big Beautiful Bill Act’ is genuinely terrifying.”

“What makes this situation even worse is that Republicans, from the president on down, are consistently lying about what the bill would do,” Cohen charged.

“The House Republican budget plan would eviscerate Medicaid and food assistance and shift resources toward the wealthiest Americans,” the Center for American Progress (CAP) warned ten days ago, adding that it “would implement the largest cuts to both Medicaid and the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) in history—kicking millions of Americans off their health insurance and taking food away from hungry children.”

“It would raise household electricity costs while trapping most middle-class and poor students in greater student loan debt to afford a higher education,” CAP’s Bobby Kogan, Senior Director for Federal Budget Policy wrote. “And it would make all these changes as a means to partially offset tax breaks that disproportionately go to the richest Americans, giving households in the top 0.1 percent a multihundred-thousand-dollar tax break on average while increasing deficits by trillions of dollars. Taken as a whole, the bill would add trillions of dollars to structural deficits despite these enormous cuts to critical services.”

“If enacted,” Kogan warned, “this would be the largest transfer of wealth from the poor to the rich in a single law in U.S. history.”

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“Taken as a whole, this bill would harm Americans—particularly the most vulnerable people—and leave the country worse off. It would lead to preventable deaths by taking health care away from millions of people. It would worsen food insecurity by taking food away from the hungry, particularly kids.”

“Budgets showcase our morality because they force governments to decide how to prioritize limited resources. The House Republican budget plan would shift funding away from the sick and hungry and, instead, toward the wealthiest Americans.”

U.S. Rep. Veronica Escobar (D-TX) responded to Foxx, saying, “In other words, ‘please don’t call this bill what it is or say what it does’.”

Watch the video below or at this link.

Foxx: The words I’ve heard today are: cut, rip, gut, kill, cruel, stealing food, losing coverage, jam through, biggest transfer of wealth from vulnerable to wealthy people, irresponsible. That is not the way we ought to be talking about this bill. pic.twitter.com/buEFXVs3Lv

— Acyn (@Acyn) May 22, 2025

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