Big, Beautiful, and Predictably Cruel

It's not just bad policy — it’s social vandalism dressed in patriotic language.

I tried to warn people.

I said it in the classroom. I said it on social media. I said it in passing conversations with politically engaged friends who were optimistic in ways I couldn’t relate to. I told them this “Big Beautiful Bill” — or more accurately, this big, dangerous piece of legislation — was always going to pass. I’ve seen the playbook before, and it never changes.

But I was told I was being negative. That I didn’t understand how “divided” the Republican caucus was. That Susan Collins had “concerns”. That Lisa Murkowski didn’t like the price tag. That Ron Johnson said he wasn’t voting for it. I’ve been doing this long enough to know what that means: nothing.

Because at its core, this isn’t about traditional legislative strategy. It’s about MAGA, and MAGA doesn’t legislate — it performs. And while there may be gradations of MAGA, the movement as a whole is not rooted in compromise or conscience. It is a machine of obedience, built around the authority of one man. There are no “better angels” to appeal to — not necessarily because the individuals are all evil, but because the structure demands total alignment. It’s not governance. It’s choreography.

And that’s why those of us who have seen this movie before knew how it would end before the opening credits. MAGA does the same thing every time: a controversial bill is introduced; a handful of Republicans express performative concern; Trump sets a deadline; cable news covers the “will-they-won’t-they”; and just before the 11th hour, they all fall in line.

Rinse. Repeat.

We’ve seen this pattern with the 2017 tax cuts. With the 2017 attempt to gut the Affordable Care Act. With the debt ceiling brinkmanship of 2023. It’s not new. In fact, it’s so predictable it feels like a political version of Scooby-Doo. At least in Scooby-Doo, they try to throw in a twist about who’s wearing the monster mask. MAGA, on the other hand, doesn’t bother. The villain enters in full costume, tells you what they’re about to do, and then does it while the audience debates whether or not to take them seriously.

For people just tuning in, this may all seem shocking — like walking into Back to the Future Part III without watching the first two. But for those of us who’ve been paying attention, it’s painfully familiar. And unfortunately, this time, the stakes are far too real.

President Trump has now signed the “Big Beautiful Bill” into law. It is not just bad policy — it’s social vandalism dressed in patriotic language. It includes over $1 trillion in Medicaid cuts, with projections that over 11 million people could lose coverage over the next decade. It slashes funding for food assistance, undermines public education, expands military spending by billions, and hands permanent tax breaks to the wealthy. It does this while adding an estimated $2.7 trillion to the national deficit, all under the banner of fiscal responsibility.

And yet, despite all that, Democrats shouldn’t waste time lamenting its passage. It was always going to pass the moment we lost control of all three branches. The real question is what we do next.

I’ve always said the Democratic Party functions best when it’s grounded in strategy and purpose. That’s what gave us Obama in 2008 and 2012. That’s what brought Joe Biden to victory in 2020. But in 2024, when panic took over strategy, we lost focus. The result wasn’t just electoral defeat. It was a vacuum that allowed the worst impulses of the right to move unchecked.

So no — this moment is not about grief. It’s about clarity.

There will be harm. That’s unavoidable. But our job now is to mitigate that harm, call it out in real time, and prepare a disciplined offensive for 2026. As bleak as things may feel, there are still strategic opportunities. The House is in play. The Senate map is difficult, but not impossible. And more importantly, the GOP has now fully branded itself to this bill. They own every line item, every cut, every tax giveaway, every act of cruelty disguised as reform.

And that’s where Project 2026 comes in.

---

---

House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, who isn’t always every progressive’s favorite voice, showed up big on July 3rd. His speech wasn’t just symbolic — it was strategic. He laid out a forward-facing vision that treated the bill not as the end of something, but the beginning of a new fight. And it’s a fight rooted in accountability.

Massachusetts Democrats, for their part, have already mobilized. Their launch of Project 2026 was swift and purposeful — a clear signal that the fallout from this bill will be the campaign issue in dozens of House races next cycle. They’re not waiting for things to “shake out.” They’re activating now.

And they’re not alone. California Congressman Robert Garcia made headlines on MSNBC by warning that there will be consequences for Republicans in 2026. His tone wasn’t desperate — it was surgical. The Democrats are no longer trying to out-panic Republicans. They’re preparing to out-organize them.

And they’re doing it with receipts. Axios reported that Democrats at every level are plotting how to turn this bill into a midterm referendum — not just in blue districts, but in red and purple ones too. The path isn’t easy, but it’s visible.

For those looking for a roadmap, Democracy Docket offered exactly that: stay message-disciplined, focus on community-based field work, develop strong candidates early, and invest in plain-language communication with working-class voters — including poor white voters, who are too often talked about but rarely talked to.

And this is where political psychology becomes essential. Because the Republican strategy here isn’t just policy-driven. It’s psychological. They rely on what behavioral scientists call obedience to authority — the idea that once a leader establishes moral dominance, supporters follow not just orders, but assumptions. Trump doesn’t have to explain why the bill helps anyone. He just needs to declare it “beautiful,” and the social reinforcement machinery does the rest.

There’s also affective polarization — the growing emotional divide between parties that makes people vote not for policies, but against their perceived enemies. MAGA doesn’t have to make life better for its base. It just has to convince them that Democrats are worse.

And then there’s what I’d like to coin here as submission optics — the performance of deliberation that exists solely to justify surrender. When MAGA lawmakers signal that they’re torn or unsure, they’re not genuinely considering policy implications. They’re managing how their loyalty looks before they vote how they were always going to. It’s not legislative wrestling. It’s compliance theater.

This is why we need to communicate differently. And honestly.

The average poor white voter in a rural district — the person who just saw their Medicaid benefits slashed and their grocery prices spike — needs to hear, in plain terms, who did this and why. They need to hear that MAGA didn’t fight for them. MAGA sacrificed them. Not in private. Not in secret. But in full view of the public.

As Lyndon B. Johnson once said, “If you can convince the lowest white man he’s better than the best colored man, he won’t notice you’re picking his pocket.” That quote isn’t just historical. It’s operational. It’s exactly how MAGA frames its appeal: inflame identity, then exploit vulnerability.

Democrats can’t out-hate that strategy, but we can out-organize it, out-educate it, and out-communicate it — if we show up everywhere. No more writing off rural communities. No more ceding white working-class spaces to right-wing media. We need our best communicators — the ones who can speak plainly, empathetically, and relentlessly — in every ZIP code.

Because this is an all-hands-on-deck moment. The damage is real. The suffering is real. But so is the path forward.

The bill passed. That’s a fact. But the story isn’t over.

The next chapter is ours to write.

Kristoffer Ealy is a political science professor who teaches at California State University Fullerton, Ventura College, Los Angeles Harbor College, and Oxnard College. He is the author of the upcoming book Political Illiteracy: Learning the Wrong Lessons.