America is drowning in debt. Our national debt has now surpassed $36 trillion, amounting to 124% of our GDP. Interest payments alone cost taxpayers $882 billion a year — 13% of the entire federal budget — just to service that debt. If we don’t act now, we risk sinking the ship. Yet, Democrats seem content to just rearrange the deck chairs while the vessel goes down.
President Trump’s “One Big Beautiful Bill” (OBBB) is no panacea, but it is a serious first step toward restoring fiscal responsibility.
The 2024 federal budget is a record-breaking $6.75 trillion, a 10% jump from 2023. But projected revenue is only $4.9 trillion, leaving a $1.8 trillion deficit — and that’s after a $1.7 trillion deficit last year. These shortfalls are financed by borrowing, which drives up interest payments even further.
More than 72% of the federal budget now goes to “mandatory” programs — Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, unemployment and debt interest. That leaves only a fraction of federal spending available for cuts.
The House version of the OBBB targets this imbalance by proposing $1.7 trillion in mandatory spending reductions over ten years, including $1 trillion in Medicaid reforms. These are both fiscally and morally necessary.
The bill would end Medicaid funding for sex-change procedures, Planned Parenthood and benefits for illegal immigrants. It adds work requirements for able-bodied recipients, shortens retroactive eligibility, removes deceased enrollees and shifts administrative costs to the states, where they can be more efficiently managed.
At the same time, the OBBB preserves the 2017 Trump tax cuts, which have already saved Americans $3.7 trillion. In fact, the bill expands relief with no taxes on tips or overtime, higher standard deductions, increased child tax credits, and new deductions for car loans and seniors — measures that will help working families recover from Biden’s suffocating inflation.
The OBBB doesn’t stop there. It would:
- Cancel Green New Deal subsidies
- Repeal Biden’s student loan bailouts
- Open federal lands to domestic energy development
- Fund the southern border wall
- Empower parents through school choice
- Introduce Trump Savings Accounts for newborns, encouraging long-term financial planning and generational wealth
The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) claims the bill will raise deficits by $2.4 trillion. Trump argues it will cut deficits by $6 trillion. So, who’s right?
Trump’s estimate is far more credible for three key reasons:
1. Keeping current tax rates in place is not new spending
The CBO treats extending the 2017 tax cuts as a loss in revenue. But those tax rates have already been in effect for eight years. Keeping them isn’t a new cost — it just avoids a massive tax hike that would cripple the economy.
2. CBO growth projections are too low
The CBO assumes economic growth will average just 1.8% annually. But under Trump’s first term, growth averaged 2.2%, and with tax relief, energy expansion, deregulation and education reform, 3% annual growth is within reach. That extra growth will generate $4 trillion in new tax revenue over 10 years.
3. Tariffs are ignored
Trump’s proposed tariffs are projected to raise $2.8 trillion in revenue — a number the CBO itself admits but fails to fully include in its analysis.
In sum, the CBO uses off-base assumptions to dismiss the bill. In reality, the OBBB offers the most serious and comprehensive path toward fiscal reform in a generation.
Trump’s OBBB won’t solve everything. But it is a bold first step that reflects more responsible leadership out of Washington than we have seen in a long time.
The ultimate takeaway from all of this is a reminder that the root of our financial problems is not money. We have more money than any nation in history. The root of the problem is spiritual. The Bible says, “the borrower is servant to the lender” (Proverbs 22:7). By spending more than we bring in, year after year, for decades, we have put ourselves in financial slavery. We have traded common sense for immediate gratification, duty for dependency and God’s wisdom for man’s vain schemes. Fiscal reform is absolutely necessary, but national repentance is the real solution.
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