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Moore, Miller vote to send Big Beautiful Bill to Trump’s desk

Speaker of the House Mike Johnson, R-La., surrounded by Republican members of Congress, holds up the final vote count while speaking following the passage of President Donald Trump's signature bill of tax breaks and spending cuts, Thursday, July 3, 2025, at the Capitol in Washington. (AP Photo/Julia Demaree Nikhinson)

CHARLESTON – Meeting a self-imposed deadline to get a bill to the desk of President Donald Trump by Independence Day, the U.S. House of Representatives passed the One Big Beautiful Bill Act Thursday afternoon.

U.S. Reps. Carol Miller and Riley Moore, both R-W.Va., joined a slim majority in voting for the H.R. 1, the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, in a 218-214 vote, after the U.S. Senate amended and passed the bill Tuesday in a tiebreaker 51-50 vote.

“In November, the American people gave President Trump a mandate for change after years of mass migration, inflation, and progressive insanity,” Moore said in a statement after Thursday’s vote. “They demanded secure borders, lower costs, and a return to common-sense. The One Big Beautiful Bill delivers on that America First agenda. I proudly voted ‘Yes’ on this historic legislation.”

The One Big Beautiful Bill Act, named such for Trump’s nickname for the bill, is a budget reconciliation package and the primary vehicle for extending the 2017 tax cuts put in place during Trump’s first term.

The bill would return $2 trillion to taxpayers over a 10-year period. The bill includes more than $1.3 trillion in cuts to help pay for the extended tax cuts. However, estimates by the Congressional Budget Office show that the bill would add $3.4 trillion to the federal deficit over the same time period.

Among other things, the One Big Beautiful Bill Act takes unobligated funds appropriated through the Inflation Reduction Act; reverses many Biden-era environmental regulations on coal, oil and natural gas; encourages the accelerated leasing and reduced royalties on public lands; pushes out an additional $150 billion in defense spending, potentially pushing the total Department of Defense budget over $1 trillion for the first time; and allocates billions to expand detention capacity, ICE activities, and Department of Justice prosecution efforts.

“The One Big Beautiful Bill gives the Trump Administration the tools it needs to reclaim our national sovereignty and ramp up mass deportations,” Moore said in a published op-ed Thursday. “It delivers the largest tax cut for working and middle-class families in American history. It also unleashes American energy, which is critical to powering our economy, reindustrializing the heartland, and winning the global AI arms race.”

However, the bill introduces stricter oversight and eligibility requirements for Medicaid, the Affordable Care Act, the Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP), and the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP). The Congressional Budget Office estimates that more than 11 million people could lose health care coverage provided by Medicaid and the Affordable Care Act expansion due to changes in the Senate version of the bill.

According to the Kaiser Family Foundation (KFF), West Virginia could see a $2.84 billion decline in federal Medicaid spending over a 10-year period, with federal Medicaid spending in rural areas decreasing by $155 billion over that same period, though a $50 billion rural health fund is meant to offset some of these reductions.

“While providers could potentially offset at least some of the cuts–including through the new rural health funding–any financial pressure on hospitals and other providers could lead to layoffs of staff, more limited investments in quality improvements, fewer services, or additional rural hospital closures,” according to the KFF analysis.

Changes to federal SNAP funding could see West Virginia paying $500 million over the next 10 years for its share of the program, formerly known as food stamps. A KFF analysis estimates that approximately 50,000 West Virginians could lose Medicaid coverage under the bill’s provisions, with another 3,600 losing coverage due to proposed ACA changes. In West Virginia, 464,821 people were enrolled in Medicaid, with CHIP enrollment at 40,445.

“West Virginia’s Congressional Delegation now has the disgraceful distinction of voting for and helping pass the largest cuts to Medicaid in history,” said Ellen Allen, executive director of West Virginians for Affordable Health Care. “In addition to historic coverage losses, 10 West Virginia hospitals and three nursing homes could be forced to shut down, resulting in layoffs and hurting local economies.”

“West Virginia’s Congressional had the power to vote this devastating bill down and protect working West Virginians and their health care, but instead, they chose to line the pockets of billionaires with even more tax breaks,” Allen continued.

The bill includes other provisions, such as eliminating taxes on tips or overtime with caps, as well as tax deductions for taxpayers in certain high-tax states. It has increases in child tax credits and creates savings accounts for children aged 8 or younger.

“This budget is Robin Hood in reverse,” said Del. Mike Pushkin, D-Kanawha, chairman of the West Virginia Democratic Party. “Donald Trump and his Republican allies are robbing the poor to enrich the wealthy. Over half a million West Virginians — including kids, veterans, seniors, and people with disabilities — just got told they don’t matter.”

“The cruelty is the point,” said Teresa Toriseva, vice chairwoman of the West Virginia Democratic Party. “They didn’t just cut programs — they went after hospitals, nursing homes, child nutrition, energy jobs, and maternal health care. It’s an assault on the people of West Virginia.”

Steven Allen Adams can be reached at sadams@newsandsentinel.com.

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