The Republicans' Disastrous Tax Bill Will Hurt My Constituents | Opinion

"I voted for Donald Trump, but this is not what I thought I was voting for."

Those are the words a West Point employee recently said to me––and they're an increasingly common refrain among the 300,000-plus exurban and rural Americans I represent as a Democrat in a district Donald Trump won by a double-digit margin.

The disastrous one-party "Big Beautiful Bill" that just passed the House and Senate and flew off of Trump's desk like a broadside will launch a thousand Democratic campaigns between now and the midterms. Its effects will play a prominent role in the off-year mayoral and gubernatorial elections this fall—and for good reason.

Those effects are set to decimate districts, like mine, that voted for Donald Trump. Cuts to Medicaid and SNAP will disproportionately impact poor and working class rural America. For us, these aren't political footballs or Beltway acronyms; they are health care for a working-class family, or a free breakfast program at a school or church, or the ability to access a community hospital and health clinic—many of which are now in jeopardy of closing.

That's not even accounting for the economic upheaval as this bill defunds solar, wind, and geothermal projects, along with the thousands of construction jobs each provides—the vast majority of which lie in Republican districts. Even some of the bill's lesser-known provisions, like its dramatic expansion of the leasing of public lands to oil and gas companies, are anathema to conservative-minded ranchers, hunters, and farmers. These Americans now face a dark future as Trump's government savages their economic model by deporting a lower-cost, undocumented workforce, even if they do not have a criminal record.

There should be a price to pay for all of this.

To make that possible, the Democratic Party must continue pounding Republicans mercilessly and with message discipline, 24 hours a day on every conceivable media platform, for falling in line behind this bill out of political spinelessness. Only in Washington's vote-yes-pray-no culture is it acceptable to make peace with the damage a vote will cause your own community or state but, when faced with the prospect of Donald Trump's political retribution, fold like a cheap suit.

Yet once we get past the immediate aftermath of this ugly bill's passage, it is also incumbent upon Democrats to do something that we failed to do enough of last year: offer a clear, affirmative, positive agenda for the American people to rally behind.

Because as much as I hear, "I voted for Trump, but this is not what I voted for," I also hear a total lack of knowledge about what Democrats stand for.

This bill provides an opportunity to make the pivot our party needs.

One of the hardest lessons of 2024 is that it's just not enough to be oppositional to Donald Trump. A big part of why certain Democrats have succeeded despite the odds in red and purple districts is their ability to cut through cultural disagreements by focusing relentlessly on a populist economic agenda.

In my case, that means taking on corporate welfare—most recently defeating a massive tax break for an Amazon warehouse. It means fighting corruption and talking relentlessly about pocketbook issues such as lowering utility bills, making buses free, and delivering property tax reform. And it means doing so anywhere and everywhere, including places from right-of-center and sports outlets to police union meeting rooms traditionally hostile to national Democrats.

If there are two things most regular voters believe, it's that they don't get value for their taxes (in other words, the government rips them off) and that many of those in government look out for special interests first.

Democrats must counter these perceptions by showing that while President Trump and Republicans act in lockstep to enrich themselves and their donors (there's even a tax break for private jets in their big bill), we will use every lever possible to reduce costs, grow wealth, and to make government work better, more efficiently, and more ethically on behalf of taxpayers. We must show voters we are not in it to create more power for ourselves or our donors, but make Americans' lives better, safer, and more prosperous.

Republicans are right to be terrified with their prospects in November 2025 and 2026; there is going to be a major reckoning for their chaotic, crooked, and extreme governance.

If Democrats capitalize on the political circumstances and offer a competing vision that clearly shows how they will deliver where the other party has failed, Republicans have a lot more to be concerned about: a political realignment that reverses the long-term trends we've seen in rural and exurban America. On the horizon, the crest of the next blue wave is visible—a potential tidal surge that dims even the gains Democrats made in 2018—and it's coming ashore fast.

James Skoufis is a New York State senator who was recently appointed to the Democratic National Committee's Executive Committee.

The views expressed in this article are the writer's own.