MADISON, Wis. — One year after congressional Republicans passed their tax law, Opportunity Wisconsin Program Director Meghan Roh highlights how Wisconsin families are still paying the price in a new op-ed for the Cap Times. The op-ed details the law’s toll on healthcare access, food assistance, and household budgets across the state, and calls out Rep. Derrick Van Orden and Rep. Bryan Steil for continuing to defend their votes.
GOP’s Big Beautiful Bill is failing Wisconsin families
The Cap Times, 7/11/26
- One year ago, congressional Republicans passed a law they called their greatest achievement. Wisconsin families have been paying for it ever since.
- The Republican tax law was sold as relief for working people. The reality? The biggest cuts to healthcare and food assistance in American history — all funded on the backs of Wisconsin families, while billionaires and big corporations walked away with a trillion-dollar windfall.
- Let’s start with healthcare. The law made the largest cut to Medicaid in U.S. history, slashing more than $900 billion from the program nationwide. In Wisconsin, 54,000 people are at risk of losing their Medicaid coverage.
- And because Republicans also let healthcare tax credits expire, another 56,000 Wisconsinites face skyrocketing costs on the marketplace, or the prospect of going uninsured altogether. All told, 110,000 Wisconsinites stand to lose their coverage.
- In Rep. Derrick Van Orden’s district, these cuts mean a 60-year-old couple could see their monthly premium jump by nearly $2,000. In Rep. Bryan Steil’s district, that same couple is looking at nearly $1,400 more per month.
- The Republican tax law also guts the food assistance that Wisconsin families rely on to put food on the table. Roughly 49,000 Wisconsinites are at immediate risk of losing some of their SNAP benefits.
- All of this so Republicans in Congress could hand the wealthiest Americans a $1 trillion tax cut over the next decade.
- One year in, it’s laughable that Republicans in Congress believe this law has been a success. They can’t hide from the reality that 110,000 Wisconsinites are at risk of losing healthcare. Tens of thousands more are losing food assistance. Grocery prices are up. Gas prices are up. Rural hospitals are closing. And Van Orden and Steil are still defending every one of those votes.
