July 3, 2025
The O’Neill Institute issued the following statement from co-faculty directors,
Professor Michele Bratcher Goodwin and Professor Lawrence O. Gostin, and Katie
Keith, director of the Center for Health Policy and the Law and director of national
affairs and programs at the O’Neill Institute, in response to the United States
Congress passing the One Big Beautiful Bill Act.
The One Big Beautiful Bill Act is a devastating assault on the health and dignity of
millions of Americans. Pushed through Congress with little transparency or public
debate, this legislation will strip nearly 12 million people of their health insurance,
drive up medical debt, and further destabilize an already strained health system. It
is one of the most aggressive rollbacks of health protections, resulting in the
biggest cuts to our nation’s safety net in modern history.
At its core, this legislation weakens the Affordable Care Act (ACA) and slashes
Medicaid—pillars that have expanded access to care and saved countless lives over
the past 15 years. It undermines Medicaid expansion and will raise premium costs
and red tape for ACA enrollees. The legislation also makes the largest cuts ever to
SNAP, which will leave millions of families facing even greater food insecurity.
The legislation further threatens reproductive care in every state by defunding
Planned Parenthood and other abortion providers. It also jeopardizes access to non-
abortion, reproductive care like contraceptives, treatment for sexually transmitted
diseases, and cervical cancer screenings.
What is being actively dismantled are programs that existed under Republican and
Democratic administrations that sought to recognize the dignity in every American
whether young or old, farmer, factory worker, or teacher. These critical safety nets
that exist in other nations as a fundamental human right are on a path of
evisceration in the United States. Notably, no meaningful alternatives are proposed
that will fill the critical void of what is being stripped away.
This is not just bad policy—the consequences will be dire. It will erode the right to
health and dignity for millions of Americans.