It was supposed to be Trump’s big legislative achievement. It could be a weapon for Democrats to win in the midterms |

President Donald Trump marked the 250th anniversary of the nation’s founding on July Fourth with a speech touting a roaring stock market, urging election reforms, and hailing military interventions in Venezuela and Iran. But another anniversary went conspicuously unmarked: the passage of the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, signed into law by Trump exactly one year earlier. At its ceremonious signing, the act seemed poised to be a defining legislative achievement for Republicans to run on in November. But 12 months later, the law’s cutbacks to key safety-net programs such as Medicaid and food stamps have fueled a chorus of criticism, challenging the effort to promote its populist and business-friendly tax cuts. While the president and his party have sought to play up the law’s most popular provisions, even attempting to recast it as a “Working Families Tax Cut Bill,” Democrats have seized on negative polling and the Republican rebrand as evidence of its failures. Today, it looks increasingly uncertain which party will benefit from the law’s passage, as the landmark policy package has become a major factor in competitive battleground races that could decide control of the Hou

Jul 12, 2026 → Jul 18, 2026