Tuesday, Jun. 3, 2025
Is Donald Trump’s megabill projected to add more than $2 trillion to the national debt?
Nonpartisan analysts estimate that President Donald Trump’s megabill would add at least $2 trillion to the national debt over 10 years.
The Congressional Budget Office’s preliminary estimate says the tax-and-spending bill now in Congress will add $2.3 trillion.
Other estimates are higher: Tax Foundation: $2.56 trillion; University of Pennsylvania’s Penn Wharton Budget Model: $2.79 trillion; Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget: $3.1 trillion, including interest payments.
Some estimates under $2 trillion account for projected economic growth, while other estimates over $5 trillion note some provisions in the bill are temporary and will likely be extended.
The debt, which is the accumulation of annual spending that exceeds revenues, is $36 trillion.
U.S. Rep. Gwen Moore, D-Milwaukee, and U.S. Sen. Ron Johnson, R-Wis., claimed the bill would add trillions.
Among other things, the bill would make 2017 individual income tax cuts permanent, add work requirements for Medicaid and food assistance, and add funding for defense and more deportations.
This fact brief is responsive to conversations such as this one.
Sources
- The Hill: GOP beats down key budget office over tax plan projections
- Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget: CBO's First Score of House Reconciliation Bill
- Tax Foundation: “Big Beautiful Bill” House GOP Tax Plan: Preliminary Details and Analysis
- Penn Wharton Budget Model: The House-Passed Reconciliation Bill: Illustrative Budget, Economic, and Distributional Effects with Permanence
- Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget: Breaking Down the One Big Beautiful Bill
- Wisconsin Watch: Did the US debt increase by $7.8 trillion during Donald Trump’s presidency?
- U.S. Treasury Department: Debt to the Penny
- U.S. Rep. Gwen Moore: Congresswoman Moore Slams Republican Cuts to Health Care to Pay for Tax Giveaways for the Wealthy
- PBS Wisconsin: Ron Johnson says Trump can't bully him off his deficit-reducing demands for a federal budget bill
- Associated Press: Trump’s ‘beautiful’ bill spans more than 1,000 pages. Here’s what’s inside it
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Fact briefs are bite-sized, well-sourced explanations that offer clear "yes" or "no" answers to questions, confusions, and unsupported claims circulating online. They rely on publicly available data and documents, often from the original source. Fact briefs are written and published by Gigafact contributor publications.
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