President Donald Trump is standing firm on his pledge to protect America’s core entitlement programs, promising that Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid will be “totally cherished” as part of his administration’s sweeping budget overhaul. Speaking aboard Air Force One on Friday, Trump dismissed critics of his “One Big Beautiful Bill,” saying their warnings were baseless.
“We cut $1.6 trillion — not billion, trillion — out of the budget, and yet we haven’t affected anybody,” Trump said. “We’re going to save and totally cherish Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid. The Democrats are going to destroy it. We’re going to save it and make it stronger than ever before.”
Trump’s comments followed a Breitbart News question regarding how his tariff strategy would reduce the deficit. The Congressional Budget Office projects Trump’s tariffs will slash deficits by $2.8 trillion over the next decade.
The president also emphasized that the only changes being made to programs like Medicaid target rampant inefficiencies. “We’re not touching it, other than waste, fraud, and abuse,” Trump explained.
He confirmed a conversation with Sen. Josh Hawley (R-MO), who raised concerns about how some Medicaid reforms could impact Trump’s rural base. “Sen. Hawley is a great senator, good guy, and I did speak to him,” Trump said. “We want to make sure that doesn’t hurt anybody. It is about waste, fraud, and abuse — that’s the only thing, and everybody wants that.”
Democrats have aggressively attacked the president’s economic package, falsely claiming it slashes safety net programs and undermines the middle class. But Trump is flipping the script — defending the nation’s most popular programs while highlighting the massive savings from cracking down on bloated bureaucracies and foreign freeloaders.
He’s also using the bill to shift the conversation back to economic nationalism, arguing that his tariff-driven revenue model means less borrowing from China and more investment in American workers. Critics have avoided addressing those numbers, choosing instead to stir fears about cuts that don’t actually exist in the legislation.
With inflation still high and global instability rising, Trump is pitching his bill as a restoration of fiscal sanity — one that doesn’t come at the expense of seniors or the working poor.
The message is resonating. During his visit to New Jersey for UFC 316, the president received a hero’s welcome as thousands of fans roared his arrival. From fighters to fans to blue-collar workers, Trump’s no-nonsense defense of Medicare and Social Security is putting Democrats on defense.
As he prepares to sign the bill into law, Trump is betting that Americans will rally around a president who can both balance the books and protect the benefits they’ve earned — a leader who saves money by punishing fraud, not punishing citizens.
