Voters Do Not Want Medicaid To Be Cut In Trump's Big Beautiful Bill: Pollster Dritan Nesho

Forbes Breaking News

On "Forbes Newsroom," HarrisX Founder and CEO Dritan Nesho discussed a new Harvard CAPS/Harris Poll which measured voters' attitudes about the Big Beautiful Bill and President Trump's tariffs.

Transcript

00:00And so we saw this last month. It narrowly passed in a House vote. It's now before the Senate.

00:06And something that Democrats and Republicans, lawmakers in the House and the Senate,

00:11the only thing all of them can really agree on is that changes will need to be made

00:15in order for it to even have a chance at passing in the Senate. And the few points of contention

00:19you touched on, one of them being the national debt. And the CBO, which is a nonpartisan office,

00:25said that this will add $3 trillion to the national debt over the next decade. Another

00:31point of contention are Medicaid cuts, which will leave millions uninsured over the next decade.

00:37What do people think about that? Are they concerned that millions of people will be left without

00:42insurance with this bill? So, you know, when we asked the question about imposing work requirements

00:52on Medicaid and staff recipients, and that's the functional language that we tested as part

00:58of the bill, actually 51% support the provision and only 44% are against it, with 15% being

01:10roughly in the middle. So it really depends how it's framed. In general, voters do not want

01:20their entitlements. They do not want these programs to be touched, even though at the same time,

01:28an overwhelming amount supports balanced budgets going forward, which by definition would actually

01:34require a lot of cuts to these different types of programs. So it's really a question of how it's

01:47framed and which side exhibits leadership on the specific provisions. I think that net-net,

01:56when it comes to imposing work requirements on Medicaid and staff recipients, it obviously,

02:01there's an affected demographic that is going to cry foul and is going to push very hard to make sure

02:07that these benefits are not lost. But the public net-net on that specific provision would go with

02:16Trump. Not by a lot, but it would go with Trump. I want to talk about tariffs now because that seems

02:22to be one of the main factors that's dragging down President Trump's approval rating just a little bit.

02:28And we're not seeing much movement on the negotiation on the deals aspect of these tariffs. Last week,

02:33we did see a handshake for a framework for a deal between the United States and China. But the tariff

02:39deadline does loom. It's less than a month away before those reciprocal tariffs go back in place,

02:45before deals need to be made. I mean, what do the American people think about all the tariff talk?

02:52Well, they're split down the middle. I mean, they're still hopeful that Trump will urge a deal

02:58with the Chinese. And they're hopeful that Trump will usher the economy into a better place. These

03:04are some of the reasons why they voted for Trump. So he hasn't quite lost that. But really, Trump owns

03:12the economy right now. And voters are very, very split about what's happening. So we asked a series

03:18of questions around tariffs and the economy. And it really illustrates where things stand, right?

03:26So we asked, who do you trust more to manage the economy? The Trump administration and Republicans

03:31or Democrats in Congress? 50-50 split. Who is mostly responsible for the state of the economy

03:37today? Donald Trump or Joe Biden? 55% Donald Trump. He owns it. Do you think Trump's policies are making

03:44the U.S. economy stronger or weaker? 51% stronger, 59% weaker. That's a statistical guide. Are Trump's

03:53policies leading to more or less jobs in the country? 49% more, 51% less. Again, a statistical

04:00tie. Are Trump's policies leading to more or less investment in the country? This is a big issue

04:06for Trump, right? He went to the Gulf region and announced trillions of dollars worth of investments.

04:12The voters are really sold on him. 49% say leading to more investment. 51% say less investment.

04:19It's Trump winning or losing the battle against inflation. 44% winning, 56% losing. This is a

04:27concerning statistic for Trump. Are Trump's tariff policies boosting or harming the economy? Again,

04:34a concerning statistic. 57% say that his tariff policies are harming the economy. But then when you

04:42ask how confident are you that Trump's economic policies will lead to stronger economic growth,

04:4847% say confident. So it was a bit down from last month where it was at 50% and 55% not confident.

04:56So there isn't really a question that we ask about the economy or about the tariffs or about inflation

05:02that doesn't have the public very, very split. And this is cause for a lot of concern with Trump because

05:10arguably you could say that he shot himself in the foot by pushing too many tariffs, too deep, too hard,

05:17too fast. The economy has proven remarkably resilient. But really there is a gap between

05:24whether or not voters today think the country is headed in the right direction and whether or not

05:30they think the economy is strong. A majority think the economy is strong, but a majority,

05:35a bigger majority of 60% or plus actually think the country and the economy is headed in the wrong

05:41direction. And so I think that three weeks from now, a month from now, we'll be monitoring very

05:48closely together what happens once the tariffs come due. But that is a moment in time that holds a lot

05:55for good or for bad for the Trump administration and how the first six months shape up to be.

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