May 22 House Passes Reconciliation Bill Proposing Significant Cuts to Medicaid and SNAP

May 22h in Bold Voices by

(May 22, 2025)

The House of Representatives has advanced a package that proposes historic cuts to both Medicaid and SNAP, and an extension of the 2017 tax cuts. These cuts were agreed-upon on a party-line vote during “markup” hearings, where a committee debates, amends, and ultimately approves a bill, in the House Committee on Energy and Commerce, House Ways and Means Committee, and House Agriculture Committee during the week of May 11th. On Sunday, the House Budget Committee combined these portions of the bill into a mega bill and advanced it through the reconciliation process. After the budget resolution made it through the Rules Committee, the House approved their final version of the package on the House floor early Thursday. The bill will not be finalized until it is agreed upon by the Senate as well.

The proposal would cut more than $300 billion from SNAP and $715 billion from Medicaid. An estimated 13.7 million people would become uninsured and more than 3 million people would lose food assistance. The proposal shifts costs and will force states to make difficult decisions in Medicaid and SNAP programs across the state.

Various factions within parties have clashed over the plan’s proposals. A sticking point on the bill for moderate House Republicans has been the state and local tax (SALT) deduction cap. A modified proposal would likely increase the SALT deduction cap to around $40,000, which is quadruple the current $10,000 cap, for individuals making $500,000 or less in income. For more conservative Republicans, the cuts proposed did not go far enough.

Medicaid proposals in particular would have a big impact on low-income children and families in the proposed House bill:

  • Individuals ages 19-64, those who are funded through Medicaid expansion, would be impacted by a number of proposed policies. Many low income adults ages 19-64 would have to meet new work reporting requirements as well as reapply every six months. One proposal would deny or terminate coverage to people not already working or participating in a qualifying activity for at least 80 hours a month, unless they qualify for an exemption. Research has shown that work requirements typically hold up enrollment and increase red tape rather than reducing it: most individuals who lose coverage are either working or caring for a loved one, but are at risk of losing coverage due to the additional paperwork barriers.
  • Retroactive coverage under both Medicaid and CHIP would be rolled back from three months to one month under these proposals. Gaps in coverage can be significant for a child given their growth and development stages, and retroactive coverage is in place to account for the time it takes to process applications, and to reduce uncompensated care (unpaid medical debt) to healthcare providers.
    The package also repeals several rules that expanded eligibility and enrollment, and limits state use of provider taxes, which is a key tool for financing the state share of Medicaid.

SNAP and SNAP-Ed would also be significantly impacted. SNAP is for low income families to help supplement their groceries. SNAP-Ed is an evidence-based program that helps with budget management, cooking healthy meals, and learning about physical activity. SNAP-Ed is at risk of being completely defunded. Other provisions related to SNAP in the bill include:

  • A major restructure of SNAP’s funding model. Right now, the federal government pays 100% of food benefits and shares administrative costs equally with states. Under the new proposals, states would be required to pay at least 5% of food benefit costs — and up to 25% if they have high error rates, which combines errors such as overpayments, underpayments, and paperwork errors. There is currently a small “grace” buffer that forgives minor payment errors. The legislation also increases the state share of administrative costs for SNAP from 50% to 75%.
  • The proposal expands work requirements for able-bodied adults without dependents: it raises the upper age limit to 64 and redefines a dependent child as under age 7 instead of under 18 for this requirement. This impacts caregivers with school-age children — as young as 7 years of age (current law impacts parents with adult children 18 and older) — by limiting benefits unless they can prove they work 20 hours a week, regardless of caregiving challenges or other barriers. The bill also has ripple effects for children as they can lose streamlined access to school meals and child nutrition programs such as WIC.

A centerpiece of the bill is extending the 2017 tax cuts, which gives 1.1 trillion in tax breaks to those making about $500,000 per year. According to the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) analysis, the tax policies would add roughly $3.8 trillion to the national debt. The Joint Committee on Taxation, which is the official revenue scorer for Congress, estimated the overall cost of the tax cuts and measures such as cuts to basic needs programs like Medicaid and SNAP would add more than $5 trillion toward the nation’s deficits.

Leadership at the Capitol continues to push for a Senate deadline of July 4 to finalize the bill, but the divide on issues among Republican camps has proved to be a challenge to moving the bill forward through the reconciliation process.

Interested in taking action to prevent these cuts to basic needs programs? Join one of these campaigns!
Defend Medicaid Days of Action – Families USA
Historic SNAP Cuts Threaten Families, States, and the Future of Food Assistance – Food Research & Action Center (FRAC)
State-by-State SNAP Fact Sheets – FRAC

Cristina Codario, Allies for Children Policy Director