The One Big Beautiful (Bad) Bill (BBB) and the $9 billion recission of foreign aid and Corporation of Public Broadcasting appropriated funding have both been signed by the pretend monarch Trump.
Sens. John Thune and Mike Rounds and Rep. Dusty Johnson all voted in approval as contrasted with their voting in opposition to leading Biden Administration legislation including American Rescue Plan Act (2021), Bipartisan Infrastructure Act (2021) and Inflation Reduction Act (2022).
Their votes were in line with Trump MAGA expectations in all cases and probably reflected the wishes of their supporters in South Dakota, but did their votes best serve the interests of South Dakota citizens?
While many taxing and spending mysteries continue to surround BBB, we do know nationally $1 trillion will be cut from Medicaid over the next decade and $200 billion will be stripped from SNAP as a means of financing tax reductions for our nations wealthiest families.
As SDSU Dean of Nursing Emerita Roberta Olson recently noted in a Register Speakout, the Medicaid loss in South Dakota is projected to be $931 million resulting in the loss of health care coverage for 13,000 of our state residents. The state negative impact of SNAP and other USDA food commodity program reductions is already being experienced as Feeding South Dakota has for the first time in the organizations 50-year history turned to the South Dakota Legislature for assistance due to the federal food and nutrition cuts. South Dakota residents are not going to lose health and nutrition benefits because of their failure to comply with new work requirements rather benefits will be lost because of a failure to successfully complete onerous semiannual documented reports regarding their eligibility status.
As I write this, South Dakota Public Broadcasting officials are attempting to formulate a path forward following the approval of the recission measure mentioned above resulting in over a $ 2 million reduction in the SDPB programming budget supposably because of their radical left-wing woke agenda. A 20% reduction in staff and elimination of significant local programming is feared.
Keep that in mind this fall as you search for the South Dakota high school football playoffs or this coming spring as you fail to find a broadcast of the state high school basketball tournaments.
Compare the impact of the recent Trump MAGA legislation on South Dakota residents to the impact on South Dakota residents resulting from the Biden Administration legislation mentioned above. South Dakota received $1.7 billion in private sector manufacturing and clean energy investments and $3.6 billion in public investments in clean energy, roads, bridges, high speed internet, safe drinking water and manufacturing. Fifty-three thousand South Dakota citizens enjoyed incr eased subsidies with their Affordable Care Act enrollments and Medicaid enrollments were increased rather than decreased. School districts, local governments, nonprofit organizations and our state government were able to fund projects that had been long delayed while simultaneously balancing their budgets.
So, we might ask, will we be better off under the Trump MAGA Acts so strongly favored by our congressional delegation than we were under the Biden Administration legislation so strongly opposed by the same delegation?
Rep. Johnson has announced his intention to seek the Republican nomination for governor in 2026 and Sen. Rounds appears poised to announce his intention to seek reelection to the U.S. Senate in 2026. Pundits project that both will be victorious. My hope is that during their campaigns they might be asked if their loyalty to the Trump MAGA agenda, which has served their political ambitions so well, has also served the best interest of South Dakota residents.
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