With “Big, Beautiful Bill” Barr puts rich donors over regular Kentuckians | Opinion

The key things that people in Kentucky need to know about Trump’s “Big, Beautiful Bill” are:

▪ It would increase the national debt by about $2.4 trillion.

▪ It would give up free money that Kentucky receives from the federal government, since for every $1.00 we send to Washington we get back roughly $1.50 in return. Much of this funding goes to things like food stamps and Medicaid.

▪ By turning away free federal funding for food stamps, it would also put the 575,000 Kentuckians who receive food stamps in the crosshairs by forcing the state to choose between 1) raising state taxes to make up for the loss in federal funding or 2) taking food stamps away from some of our most vulnerable neighbors.

▪ By turning away federal funding for Medicaid, it would also kick at least 200,000 Kentuckians off of Medicaid.

If you read Representative Andy Barr’s June 10 OpEd, you’d never guess this bill would be harmful to Kentucky at all. Given that we live in a state where about 28% of citizens receive Medicaid and the bill calls for substantial cuts to Medicaid, you’d think these changes would be a bigger issue to him than, say, the attack on Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, trans surgeries, or the border with Mexico (we have to drive through three states including Texas to get there). But apparently, Barr cares more about the fewer than 4,000 trans surgeries funded by Medicaid each year in the entire country than he does about the hundreds of thousands of Kentuckians he’s voted to kick off of Medicaid.

Despite all the harm this bill would cause to some of the most vulnerable people in Kentucky, I believe him when he says “It was an easy vote.” In fact, there are two obvious reasons why this was an easy vote for him.

First, he’s decided to make himself one of President Trump’s most loyal lap dogs because a Trump endorsement will help him win the Republican primary for Mitch McConnell’s seat when McConnell retires from the US Senate in 2027 at a youthful and energetic 84.

Second, but no less important, Barr has — just like McConnell — made a political career of pretending to represent Kentucky while actually serving the interests of elites who fund his campaigns. In his 2023-24 congressional campaign, only 6.3% of his campaign funding came from individuals who gave less than $200. All the small donations of $200 or less that Barr received combined for about $300,000, while the 124 donors who spent at least $5,400 on his campaign gave over $900,000.

About 70% of his money also came from out of state, meaning that his funding came mostly from rich people out of state. But even the donors in his district tended to be especially rich. One family that owns a horse farm donated over $23,000 to his campaign. The top sources of Barr’s funding, aside from the aforementioned horse farm, include employees and executives of American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), Goldman Sachs, Blackstone Group, Wells Fargo, and Banc of California. All of this is easily verifiable by looking up his profile on the campaign finance transparency website Open Secrets and examining his FEC filings.

All this is to say: Barr doesn’t represent us. He represents the economic elites who fund his campaigns. Of course the “Big, Beautiful Bill” was an easy vote for him. While it would harm hundreds of thousands of people in Kentucky and increase the debt by trillions, it would help make the rich people who fund his campaigns even richer. That’s what really matters to Andy Barr.

Peter Lynch received his PhD in American Politics from the University of Kentucky and has taught political science courses at the University of Kentucky, Centre College, and Eastern Kentucky University.