As the Trump administration pushes its “One Big Beautiful” bill along in its journey from the House to the Senate, it’s attracted quite a bit of scrutiny.
The legislation covers a wide range of issues: ending taxes on tips and overtime pay, extending and expanding existing tax cuts, increasing the child tax credit, barring Medicaid from funding Planned Parenthood and more.
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While some Republicans agree with some of what’s laid out in the bill, others are not so eager, especially since it would increase the deficit by $3.8 trillion by 2034, according to a preliminary analysis from the Congressional Budget Office.
Another thing the bill addresses is a promise President Trump made on the campaign trail:Â eliminating federal income taxes on Social Security benefits for seniors.
Related: Dave Ramsey has blunt words on Social Security, 401(k)s
While he was not able to deliver on that promise due to legislative constraints, the One Big Beautiful bill does address the issue in another way.
Were it to pass the Senate, the bill would change the way married couples 65 years of age and older do tax deductions, raising the standard deduction to $35,200, with an additional $8,000 “senior bonus” deduction.
“This expanded deduction is designed to provide financial relief to older taxpayers and would be available to those who take the standard deduction and those who itemize,” said TheStreet’s Senior Retirement Editor Robert Powell.
However, the deduction may have a challenge ahead in passing the Senate.
Social Security changes could be coming for married couples over 65.
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Senators talk opposition to bill
While the House seemed fairly quick to pass Trump’s bill, new comments from Sen. Ron Johnson, R-Wis., make it clear that passing the Senate is going to be an entirely different story.
Johnson said he thinks there are “enough” Republicans to “stop the process” in order to prioritize stronger reductions in spending and the national deficit, per an interview with CNN during “State of the Union.”
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Johnson also said he believes congressional Republicans should go over the bill with great care, referring to Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) as a example for how it should be reviewed “line by line.”
The senator has openly criticized the trillion-dollar increase the bill would add to the deficit, calling it “mortgaging our children’s future.”
Johnson is not the only senator to express reservations about the bill. Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., also called the current spending cuts in the bill “wimpy and anemic” in an interview on “Fox News Sunday.”
“I would still support the bill even with wimpy and anemic cuts if they weren’t going to explode the debt,” Paul said.“The problem is the math doesn’t add up.”
Sen. Josh Hawley, R-Mo., has also spoken against the bill in its current form, saying the Senate will “basically write its own version of the bill.”
One thing Hawley said he opposed was the bill’s proposed Medicaid cuts, which would rescind health coverage for about 8.6 million people.
“I just want to make sure that there are no Medicaid benefit cuts,” Hawley said.
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