For Immediate Release
July 1, 2025
Contact:
Sierra Salgado Pirigyi
Communications Director
Nebraska Appleseed
Office: 402-438-8853 x116
sierrasp@upgrade.neappleseed.org
RELEASE: US Senate Passes Budget That Will Devastate Nebraska Communities
The Senate takes the same destructive path as the House, advancing a bill that will result in tens of thousands of Nebraskans losing access to healthcare and food
LINCOLN, NE – Today, the U.S. Senate passed their version of a budget reconciliation package. Like the House-passed bill, the Senate went even further to strip health care and food supports away from tens of thousands of Nebraskans and their families.
With over $1 trillion in cuts to programs that keep communities healthy and strong, Nebraska’s Senators voted to advance a destructive agenda that fails the people of this state and the country. At the same time, this bill drastically increases overall spending by prioritizing tax breaks that benefit billionaires, as well as historically unprecedented funding for sweeping and unproductive deportations of everyday working people that will separate families.
Just like the House, the Senate rushed through the process, making last minute changes to their bill, to advance policies that will take away some – if not all – of some Nebraskans’ access to healthcare and food. This bill will have devastating consequences for countless Nebraskans.
Increasing Harmful Immigration Enforcement by:
- Unprecedented spending totalling approximately $126 billion for family detention and jailing on an unimaginable scale, and for sweeping and unproductive enforcement of long-outdated immigration laws – separating local neighbors and families, and destabilizing whole communities.
Dismantling SNAP by:
- Shifting huge, unmanageable costs to states to cover SNAP, risking loss of benefits or eligibility for the 150,000 Nebraskans currently utilizing the program.
- Implementing additional SNAP work requirements on older Nebraskans up to age 64, parents of young children, former foster youth, people experiencing homelessness and veterans who are already struggling to keep food on the table and were previously exempt from these red-tape reporting barriers.
Taking Away Health Care from Nebraskans by:
- Slashing Medicaid and the Affordable Care Act, resulting in nearly 17 million people losing health insurance coverage and costs going up for the rest.
- These proposals include attacks on Nebraska’s voter-approved Medicaid expansion, which provides more than 65,000 Nebraskans with life-saving health care coverage, by:
- Imposing unnecessary work requirements that put up to 40,000 Nebraskans at risk of losing their health care.
- Ending Medicaid and Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP) coverage for Nebraska children and families who are refugees, asylees, certain victims of domestic violence and trafficking, and people granted humanitarian protection.
Weakening the Child Tax Credit by:
- Taking the Child Tax Credit away from U.S. citizen children with parents who are stuck in immigration limbo.
- Increasing the Child Tax Credit for higher income families – while leaving out at least 17 million of our lowest-income children.
This package is a generational threat to Nebraska communities and families that will push substantial costs onto states, further straining our state budget. These priorities are entirely misaligned with Nebraska values.
Due to differences in the House and Senate passed bills, the House will need to vote again before final passage. It is urgent that Congressmen Flood, Bacon and Smith again hear from Nebraskans who support health and stability for whole communities – not budgets that would drastically increase overall costs by giving tax cuts to the wealthiest while cutting health care, taking food off the table, and separating local families and neighbors who are stuck in limbo because of long-outdated immigration laws.
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