Protestors Slam Vance, Trump for Health Care Cuts

Protestors picket S. Pennsylvania Avenue during Vice President JD Vance visit to Milwaukee. Photo taken May 8, 2026 by Graham Kilmer.

For the past month, a group of protesters has traveled around the state opposing cuts to federal health care programs in President Donald Trump‘s One Big, Beautiful Bill Act.

They picketed on S. Pennsylvania Avenue, on the eastern end of Milwaukee Mitchell International Airport, ahead of Vice President JD Vance‘s arrival in Milwaukee on Wednesday morning. The Trump administration has often claimed, without evidence, that it is cutting waste, fraud and abuse in government health care programs. Vance was in Milwaukee to give a speech pushing this theme and to attend a Republican fundraiser.

The protesters — made up of local residents and a coalition of community organizations and activists — weren’t buying Vance’s message. The administration’s claims of fraud are a smokescreen for cutting public health care funding to pay for tax cuts that primarily benefit wealthy individuals and corporations, said LuAnn Bird, an activist and former Democratic candidate for public office.

The One Big Beautiful Bill Act, signed into law in July 2025, will reduce federal spending on Medicaid and food assistance by more than $1 trillion, according to the Congressional Budget Office (CBO). The number of uninsured people in the country is expected to increase by 10.9 million because of the bill, according to a CBO analysis.

“We want everyone to have health care, and the GOP MAGA people, including JD Vance, have cut it,” Bird said. “They’ve taken away health care for poor, vulnerable, disabled people, and we’re all out here to say no, that is not fraud, waste and abuse. Those are people who need health care.”

Bird and the coalition have been traveling the state publicizing the findings in a recent study by the consumer advocacy organization Public Citizen, which identifies a number of hospitals in Wisconsin threatened by the Medicare and Medicaid cuts.

Jean Grow, an activist with Indivisible MKE, was at the protest because she is greatly concerned about the millions of Americans who stand to lose access to health care. It’s also more than statistics for her. “I have a 2-year-old disabled granddaughter, and I fear for her future and the possible cutting of Medicaid funding, which she will need for the rest of her life,” Grow said.

Brian von Helms, a local educator, told Urban Milwaukee he felt compelled to use his voice “if J.D. Vance was in earshot and just let him know that he’s a screw-up.” There are a lot of problems in the U.S., von Helms said, ticking off concerns about AI data centers, the growing use of surveillance systems like Flock cameras, and immigrant neighbors being arrested by federal authorities. Meanwhile, as von Helms sees it, Vance is busy pushing a culture war agenda, sowing division and actively making the country worse.

“Don’t come back to Milwaukee” — that’s what von Helms would say to Vance if he met him. “We like immigrants. Everyone’s welcome here, but you are not. I’d rather have an immigrant neighbor than J.D. Vance anywhere near me.”

Another protester, Calena Roberts, is a senior organizer and co-founder of Power to the Polls. The organization works year-round to encourage political engagement and voter participation. She is concerned about the effect federal spending cuts will have on hospitals and health clinics that rely on Medicaid funding.

“We have to stand up and fight back,” she said. “You’ve heard it this morning.”