Sen. Mark Kelly says President Donald Trump’s ‘big beautiful bill’ is bad policy

PHOENIX — President Donald Trump’s “One Big Beautiful Bill Act” is currently making its way through Congress and was recently criticized by former Trump aide and billionaire Elon Musk.

Musk posted to X calling the bill a “disgusting abomination” on Tuesday.

“I think a blind squirrel can find a nut every so often, and I think that’s the case here with Elon,” Sen. Mark Kelly told KTAR News 92.3 FM’s Arizona Morning News on Wednesday.

However, Kelly did end up somewhat agreeing with Musk.

“It’s bad policy. It cuts an enormous amount of money out of Medicaid. So, people will lose their health care: kids, seniors, even pregnant moms,” Kelly said.

“It also takes $30 billion a year out of food assistance,” Kelly said. “A lot of that food assistance goes to kids. So, kids are going to be hungry if this legislation passes in its current form.”

Although the bill would cut taxes by $3.75 trillion, it would also increase deficits by $2.4 trillion over the next decade, according to a Wednesday analysis from the Congressional Budget Office (CBO).

In addition, the CBO estimated that 10.9 million people would have no health insurance under the bill by 2034, which includes 1.4 million people who are in the U.S. without legal status in state-funded programs. The CBO also stated that the bill would reduce federal spending by nearly $1.3 trillion over that time.

What else did Sen. Mark Kelly have to say about the “big beautiful bill”?

“This adds $3 trillion to the debt over 10 years,” Kelly said. “So, there are cuts to Medicaid and the reason they’re cutting Medicaid is so it doesn’t even add more money to the debt. And it’s all in the justification to continue to provide a tax cut for the wealthiest Americans.”

Kelly added that around 65% of the cuts go to the top 10%.

He is all for cutting taxes for working class and middle-class people but doesn’t believe their taxes should be raised.

“But billionaires can pay some more and still be billionaires. The math on this is not — it’s not hard,” Kelly said.

Kelly believes the bill will backfire on its supporters and will hurt Arizonans who rely on Medicaid and SNAP.

Republicans also have concerns about the “big beautiful bill”

He said he had a Wednesday talk with a Republican colleague who expressed concerns about the bill’s impact on renewable energy tax credits.

“He has concerns … that if all these tax incentives go away, we’re going to have a harder time adding energy to the grid as we have been over the last few years,” Kelly said.

Kelly noted that 90% of the energy sources that the U.S. has added to the grid have been solar, wind and hydroelectric, not oil and gas. He added that oil and gas can’t make up for the energy the U.S. needs as the wait for a two-cycle gas generator for a power plant is currently around four years.

This would mean a massive loss in jobs in Arizona if the provisions in the bill don’t change, he added.

“What we put in legislation has caused in states like Arizona and Florida — and other states, even states with wind — a tremendous amount of jobs, but also the energy that we need to continue to innovate with technology like artificial intelligence,” Kelly said.

“But if they roll back what was in the the Inflation Reduction Act completely, a lot of those jobs are going to go away. Energy prices are going to go up for Arizonans and people across the country.”

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