Maine Democratic U.S. Reps. Chellie Pingree and Jared Golden voted Thursday against Republicans' massive spending bill, describing it as an extreme proposal that will slash health coverage and food benefits for thousands of Mainers.
The bill is the centerpiece of President Donald Trump's domestic agenda, but Golden and Pingree both framed it as a blueprint for a massive wealth transfer from the poorest Americans to the wealthiest.
Both highlighted its provisions slashing Medicaid and enhanced tax credits for health insurance plans purchased on the Affordable Care Act exchange. More than 400,000 Mainers rely on Medicaid, or MaineCare, for health insurance and multiple analyses suggest 50,000 of them could lose it if the bill becomes law.
Golden, in a statement, said his vote was one of "easiest 'no' votes I've ever taken."
"The House GOP had every opportunity to work across the aisle to write a budget that put middle-class families first. Instead, they’re ramming through an extreme agenda that takes health care away from the working poor and borrows trillions of dollars to fund a package of tax cuts tilted in favor of those at the top,” he said. "Mainers want more health care, not less. They want a tax code where everyone pays their fair share."
He added that the bill fails on each of those fronts.
The benefit cuts, as well as reductions in food assistance for low-income people, are being used to fund tax cuts. Pingree cited estimates from the Congressional Budget Office showing that the bottom 10% of Americans would lose 2% of their income through the loss of benefits, while the top 10% of earners would increase.
"This bill cruelly strips coverage from an estimated 50,000 Mainers, threatens the survival of health care providers like hospitals and nursing homes, and transfers enormous financial burdens onto our already strained state budget," Pingree said in a statement. "Additionally, SNAP benefits — which provide a modest $2-per-meal lifeline to our veterans, seniors, and children — will be drastically gutted."
Both also criticized how the bill will add trillions in federal debt, a problem that has already led credit agencies to downgrade the U.S. credit rating.
The bill also slashes clean energy credits, jeopardizing 140 projects in Maine that currently qualify for them, according to Nick Janzen, policy director for the Maine League of Conservation Voters.
“This reconciliation bill is extreme, reckless and puts the interests of billionaires ahead of everyday Maine people," Janzen said. "The gutting of the clean energy tax credits will increase already rising gas and electricity costs for Maine families and businesses and kill jobs for skilled workers in our state."
House Republicans have championed the bill as the beginning of Trump's policy agenda.
"After four long years of President Biden’s failures, President Trump’s America First agenda is finally here, and we are advancing that today," House Speaker Mike Johnson said Thursday morning.
The bill now moves to the Senate, where Republicans could pass it with a simple majority.
