Blue-state leaders weigh new laws to deal with financial fallout from Trump's big bill

State lawmakers are scrambling to deal with the expected financial fallout from President Donald Trump’s “One Big Beautiful Bill,” with many in blue states demanding special legislative sessions they say are necessary to shore up funding for health care and food assistance programs affected by the new law

State lawmakers are scrambling to deal with the expected financial fallout from President Donald Trump’s “One Big Beautiful Bill,” with many in blue states demanding special legislative sessions they say are necessary to shore up funding for health care and food assistance programs affected by the new law.

Democratic governors in at least five states are weighing such special sessions, and Democratic lawmakers in several more are urging their governors to convene them to address expected funding shortfalls.

Trump’s law institutes steep cuts to Medicaid and food aid benefits, mostly by establishing new work requirements. It also restricts state-levied fees on health care providers that are mostly used to fund Medicaid, which 72 million people rely on for health care coverage. The federal government is also no longer responsible for reimbursing states.

The changes will have an outsized effect on people in rural areas, who are likelier to receive their health insurance through Medicaid, and the cuts especially affect the 41 states that voted to expand Medicaid under the Affordable Care Act. The law also means millions of low-income people will lose eligibility for the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, also known as food stamps, and it shifts administrative costs to states.

The combination has state lawmakers saying they face new burdens on their own budgets, and groups of them are clamoring for their legislatures to rapidly identify solutions that can help fill in the shortfalls or avoid major state budget deficits.