Americans Aren’t Sold on Trump’s ‘Big, Beautiful’ Tax Law
WSJ poll says 52% of respondents oppose the package, showing Republicans’ challenges in touting its benefits ahead of the midterms
- WSJ poll finds that 70% of Americans believe Trump’s tax plan favors the wealthy.
- The tax-and-spending law has 42% support and 52% opposition, with negative marks from most Democrats and more than half of independents.
- The law is projected to increase budget deficits by $3.4 trillion through 2034, with tax cuts outweighing spending cuts.
WASHINGTON—Americans view President Trump’s tax-and-spending law as a win for wealthy households and large corporations that will hurt poor people and widen federal budget deficits, according to a new Wall Street Journal poll.
The findings show Republicans’ challenges in selling the law’s benefits as they try to hold their slim control of the House and Senate in next year’s midterm elections, and the poll demonstrates how Democrats might be able to capitalize on voters’ skepticism to stage a comeback.
Overall, the law drew 42% support and 52% opposition, performing slightly worse than Trump himself in the poll. It generated negative marks from 94% of Democrats, 12% of Republicans and 54% of independents.
Nearly 70% of overall poll respondents said the law would help the wealthy, while just 7% said that group would be hurt. At least half of poll respondents said the legislation would harm poor people, the working class, Social Security beneficiaries, the U.S. economy, Medicaid recipients, nutrition-assistance recipients and the federal budget deficit.
“Cutting Medicaid is unpopular. Cutting food assistance is unpopular,” said Sen. Brian Schatz (D., Hawaii). “Cutting those things in order to fund tax cuts for the very wealthy is unpopular, so it’s like it was designed in a lab to be unpopular.”
The law contains more in tax cuts than spending cuts, and it is projected to increase budget deficits by $3.4 trillion through 2034, compared with doing nothing, according to the Congressional Budget Office. In the short run, that means tangible benefits for tens of millions of Americans in bigger paychecks and larger tax refunds, and Republicans say they are confident the law’s standing will improve as Americans learn more about it.
Republicans said they are proud of the law and are confident they can highlight its border security, energy production and tax-cut provisions, and argue that Democrats effectively voted to increase taxes by opposing the tax-cut extensions.
“It’s wildly popular when people hear what’s in the bill. It’s a great bill,” said Rep. Richard Hudson (R., N.C.), who runs House Republicans’ campaign arm. “So we just need to tell the truth.”
Although Americans have a clear view of many provisions, and they favor Trump’s new tax cuts, they are mixed on what the legislation overall means for them, leaving openings for both parties to shape public opinion. Respondents were nearly evenly split on whether people like them would benefit. And 39% said their households would mostly be harmed by the legislation with another 20% saying it would make no difference to them.
The Wall Street Journal poll of 1,500 registered voters was conducted July 16 to July 20 by two firms—one run by Democrat John Anzalone and the other by Republican Tony Fabrizio. The margin of error for the full sample is plus or minus 2.5 percentage points.
Respondents were reached by landline or cellphone, with some respondents contacted by text messages and invited to take the survey online.
The poll shows paths for Republicans to promote the law. New tax cuts—breaks for tipped workers, senior citizens and overtime pay—all generate strong support, winning not just a supermajority of respondents but also a majority of Democrats. In particular, Trump’s “no tax on tips” policy has broken through to voters as a positive—and is still being overwhelmed by the rest of the legislation and opposition to tax cuts for high-income people.
“People know about the fact that it includes no tax on tips and they really like that,” said Molly Murphy, president of Anzalone’s firm, Impact Research. “It’s not outweighing their concerns about cuts to healthcare, cuts to food services, kind of the other pieces in the bill.”
Trump signed the legislation—the “one big, beautiful bill”—on July 4, and it is the biggest policy accomplishment of his second term so far. The law extends tax cuts that were scheduled to expire Dec. 31, lowers projected spending on Medicaid and nutrition assistance, boosts funding for immigration enforcement and national defense and adds new tax breaks for businesses and middle-income households.
Support for changes to Medicaid and nutrition assistance vary greatly depending on how they are described. A majority of poll respondents oppose cutting Medicaid, the health insurance program for lower-income households. But when cuts are described as work requirements and more frequent eligibility checks—a significant part of the plan—a majority is in favor.
They support making able-bodied recipients work 20 hours a week by a 62% to 34% margin, but that backing vanishes when they are asked if they favor removing benefits from people who don’t comply with a work requirement.
Democrats have described work requirements and other Medicaid changes as cuts to the program and they have warned that changes to state funding formulas will cause benefit reductions and hospital closures. Republicans say the law targets waste, fraud and abuse in the health insurance program.
“Any of the negative polling is because of Democrats’ lies,” said Rep. Jason Smith (R., Mo.), chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee.
Republicans may benefit from the implementation schedule they wrote. Some new tax cuts started this year and will show up in larger tax refunds in early 2026—before the midterms. That was an intentional choice in contrast to the 2017 tax law. Then, GOP tax cuts largely arrived through smaller paycheck withholding in 2018 and not refunds that were more visible to voters.
The largest spending cuts, meanwhile, won’t take effect until after the midterm elections.
“Next year, they’re not going to have people kicked off Medicaid,” Smith said. “Next year, they’re going to have no tax on tips, no tax on overtime, tax relief for seniors. All of that’s going to be there when they file their taxes.”
Still, Americans on health-insurance exchanges might pay higher prices because of Republicans’ decision—so far—not to extend expanded premium subsidies that expire after this year. And hospitals and states are already discussing ways to cope with the future cuts in ways that voters might notice.
In a recent interview with The Wall Street Journal, House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D., N.Y.) said Democrats will continue holding rallies and giving speeches, noting it will be “incredibly important” for them to explain the legislation’s negative consequences.
“We believe that if we reach enough people over the next 15 months, this Republican majority will be rejected,” Jeffries said.
Democrats say they see the law as the defining midterm election issue and are planning events at hospitals and in GOP-held districts to highlight its downsides.