League denounces harmful budget plan that the U.S. House passed this morning

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
April 10, 2025

CONTACT:
Laura Millard Ross
lauramr@mlpp.org
517-281-1084

League denounces harmful budget plan that the U.S. House passed this morning

Budget plan would harm millions of Michiganders and deepen income inequalities across the country

LANSING, Mich. – The Michigan League for Public Policy continues to strongly denounce a harmful budget plan that the U.S. Senate passed over the weekend and that was passed by the U.S. House today.  The budget plan would harm millions of Michiganders and deepen income inequalities across the country. The following statement can be attributed to Monique Stanton, President & CEO of the Michigan League for Public Policy:

“What the U.S. House just voted for is a downright reckless budget plan that clearly puts the interests of wealthy corporations and the richest Americans over the essential needs of everyday workers and families who are struggling to make ends meet. The plan lays the groundwork for a harmful tax and budget bill that would seek to cut essential social service programs such as Medicaid and the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) in order to fund massive tax giveaways for the wealthy. Going after social safety net programs like Medicaid and SNAP will cause significant financial hardship, deepen health inequalities and worsen food insecurity for countless American families, including families right here in Michigan. In our state alone, 2.6 million people rely on Medicaid — including over 1 million children — and more than 1.4 million Michiganders rely on SNAP. 

“Even with catastrophic cuts to these critical programs, the tax breaks that are being considered are so costly that they will undoubtedly result in a major spike in the national deficit.

“We need a better path forward. Members of Congress must consider the people who elected them and the commitments they made to ease their financial burdens. A budget plan that seeks to harm families with low incomes in order to serve those at the very top is not only nonsensical and irresponsible, but flat-out cruel. Budgets are moral documents. A responsible plan would ask corporations and the wealthy to pay their fair share, while at the same time lowering health care and food costs, expanding the Child Tax Credit, and investing in the working families who make up the backbone of our nation.

“Disingenuous and deceptive moves have been made by both Senate and House Republicans to mask the truth about this unconscionable budget plan. The significant cost of the tax cuts being proposed have been egregiously understated and the full breadth of reductions that will need to be made to Medicaid, food assistance, student loans and other critical programs have been concealed. The reality is that the budget would strip away essential support from the very people that the president vowed to protect on the campaign trail — all while delivering an average annual tax cut of $62,000 to households earning over $1 million, according to the Tax Policy Center.

“The plan includes at least $5.3 trillion in tax breaks over the next nine years — exceeding the cost of extending the 2017 tax cuts by $1.5 trillion — and that number could go even higher with additional program cuts currently under consideration by the U.S. Senate Finance Committee.

“According to the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy, simply extending the 2017 tax cuts would give the wealthiest 1% of Michiganders an average tax cut of $35,970, while the 20% of Michiganders with the lowest incomes, who are already struggling to get by, would receive an average tax cut of a mere $90. What’s worse is that we expect the plan to go well beyond this — providing windfall tax handouts for wealthy Michiganders while making it harder for the rest of us to see a doctor, put food on our table and send our kids to school.

“It’s becoming abundantly clear that many in Congress are embracing a dangerous agenda that threatens public services and undermines democratic processes. Alongside the budget, Republicans are advancing executive actions that unlawfully withhold congressionally approved funding, politicize and weaken the civil service, and undermine institutions like the Social Security Administration and the Treasury Department — threatening the privacy and stability of millions of Americans. 

“This budget plan — like so much of the current federal administration’s agenda — is reckless and upside down in terms of who it is serving. Passage of this budget plan by Congress will effectively break  more promises, deepen the already massive income gaps in our country, and put the interests of the wealthy above the needs of the nation. The American people deserve better than this. They deserve a budget plan that brings about shared prosperity — not one that leaves far too many workers, families and children behind.”

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The Michigan League for Public Policy, www.mlpp.org, is a nonprofit policy institute focused on opportunity for all. Its mission is to use data to educate, advocate and fight for policy solutions that undo historic and systemic racial and economic inequities to lift up Michiganders who have been left out of prosperity. It is the only state-level organization that addresses poverty in a comprehensive way.