Pocan Joins State Democrats To Warn of Local Impacts From Federal Cuts

Democratic U.S. Rep. Mark Pocan talks Wednesday morning about programs in Wisconsin that could be affected by Republican proposals to cut the federal budget. Assembly Minority Leader Greta Neubauer (D-Racine), left, and Senate Minority Leader Dianne Hesselbein (D-Middleton), right, also took part in the state Capitol press conference. (Photo by Erik Gunn/Wisconsin Examiner)

As the Republican majority in Congress begins work on legislation to renew and expand the 2017 federal tax cut, Wisconsin Democrats met with reporters Wednesday to argue that the measure will have a devastating impact on the public.

The U.S. House has begun work on a budget reconciliation bill — complex legislation that will encompass a broad swath of federal programs. President Donald Trump endorsed the effort on X Wednesday.

Senate Democrats at a Washington, D.C., press conference, including Wisconsin Sen. Tammy Baldwin, warned of “massive cuts” to Medicaid on the horizon Wednesday if the package is enacted, notwithstanding Trump’s comments this week that Medicare and Medicaid “won’t be touched.”

In Madison, U.S. Rep. Mark Pocan (D-Town of Vermont) along with Democratic leaders in the state Legislature gathered in the state Capitol Assembly parlor, where they focused not just on Medicaid but on a host of other programs that they said were important to Wisconsin.

House Republicans are seeking a $1.5 trillion cut in spending over 10 years, Pocan said, while raising the debt ceiling by $4 trillion, with the goal of a $4.5 trillion tax cut over 10 years.

Calculations by the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy found that savings from extending the 2017 tax cuts enacted in Trump’s first term would favor the richest 1% of taxpayers most dramatically.

“So this is about a tax cut for the wealthiest,” Pocan said. “It’s about a transfer of money from programs that affect the middle class and those aspiring to be in the middle class to the wealthiest — so that the rich will get even richer.”

Budget reconciliation bill

Under the budget reconciliation process, Pocan explained, Republicans have assigned spending targets to U.S. House committees for the agencies in their purview. The House Energy and Commerce Committee alone has been instructed to find $880 billion in cuts, Pocan said — and Medicaid is the largest program under the committee’s jurisdiction.

“And you know, really the better way to describe Medicaid is — that’s funding for opioid treatment, that’s funding for mental health, that’s funding for nursing home care, for maternity and infant care, help for people with disabilities, and a whole lot more,” Pocan said. “So it’s really about programs that affect people in Wisconsin.”

Medicaid serves more than 1 million people in Wisconsin, Pocan said, including one-third of Wisconsin children, 45% of working age people living with disabilities and 55% of nursing home residents.

Proposals circulating in Washington would cut $230 billion from the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA). “That would result in about a 23% cut to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program [SNAP],” Pocan said. Some 702,000 Wisconsinites “benefit from the SNAP program, and it really is at risk.”

Pocan scoffed at the idea that a project to cut government spending, headed by Elon Musk, was intended to promote government efficiency. The Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) is not an official federal agency.

“DOGE is something that was created to find waste, fraud and abuse in government,” Pocan said. “The reality is, that is a fraud. It is really about finding $4.5 trillion ultimately to have a tax cut.”

Lawmakers hear from anxious voters

Assembly Minority Leader Greta Neubauer (D-Racine) said she and her colleagues in the Legislature are hearing daily from constituents anxious about the prospect of federal cutbacks.

“We are getting calls from concerned Wisconsinites about whether they will lose access to their health care or housing,” Neubauer said. “We hear those stories every day, and we know that the actions that Trump is taking at the federal level have real impacts, and we are going to do everything we can to protect the people of Wisconsin from these attacks.”

Sen. Dianne Hesselbein, the Senate minority leader, said she’s heard from farmers, parents and Medicaid recipients, among others, worried about changes in Washington.

“What happens in Congress over the next few weeks and months matters,” Hesselbein said. She urged Wisconsin voters to let their congressional representatives know about concerns they have.

“Contact Ron Johnson,” the Republican U.S. Senator from Oshkosh, Hesselbein said. “Let them know these real stories and what that’s going to mean to the people in our community. People are upset, they are worried. They’ve had enough, and we need to stop the madness.”

Impoverished students and veterans’ health

Speakers who joined Pocan highlighted the direct impact of other programs that have been targeted for reduction.

Title I funds go to school districts with a large number of children living in poverty, while the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) provides additional aid to schools for teaching students with disabilities. Title I directs about $235 million a year to Wisconsin and IDEA about $271 million, Pocan said, and both have been targeted for reductions.

“Title I funding is a lifeline to my school right now, and for millions of students across America,” said Elizabeth O’Leary, a special education teacher in Madison. “These funds provide crucial support for instruction in reading, math, as well as special programs, after-school initiatives and summer learning opportunities.”

O’Leary described students with disabilities and students living in extreme poverty.

“Our school team works together to meet the basic needs of our students and also to teach them,” she said, adding that the school where she works has many students facing those and other difficulties.

“And while these students’ lives are difficult, they are so magnificent and they deserve the opportunity to learn and thrive,” O’Leary said. “Simply put, our students would not get the support they need, and staff would lose their jobs, without Title I funding.”

Other Trump administration actions outside the budget bill are also hitting Wisconsin, Pocan said, such as layoffs in the Department of Veterans Affairs health system.

Yvonne Duesterhoeft, a U.S. Air Force veteran, said the VA health system is a trusted health care provider for thousands of former service members.

“I wish everyone in America could have access to the type of efficient and comprehensive health care that I and many veterans have come to know in recent decades,” Duesterhoeft said.

Decades ago, she acknowledged, the system was underfunded and often indifferent to the needs of returning wartime veterans, but that has changed as Vietnam-era vets campaigned for, and won, important improvements in VA health care quality.

“We must guard against the recent and concerted fast-track effort to make VA health care terrible again,” she said.

Pocan, state Dems highlight what GOP federal budget plan could cost Wisconsin residents was originally published by the Wisconsin Examiner.