Shapiro: VP Vance parachutes into NEPA to lie about benefits of Trump’s bill

WILKES-BARRE — With Vice President JD Vance visiting Northeast Pennsylvania on Wednesday to tout the recently enacted Big Beautiful Bill, Gov. Josh Shapiro said there really isn’t much to celebrate.

“As the Vice President heads to PA, don’t forget he was the deciding vote on the federal budget that will do real damage while ballooning our national deficit,” Shapiro said. “From gutting health care and food benefits to killing tens of thousands of energy jobs, the bill is a disaster for people across PA.”

Shapiro offered some “facts” that he said represent the harm the bill Vance was touting will actually do to the Commonwealth.

Shapiro said as a result of the bill Vance was the deciding vote to pass:

• 510,000 Pennsylvanians are at risk of being knocked off their healthcare, including more than 310,000 off Medicaid.

• 140,000 Pennsylvanians will lose food assistance and the Commonwealth will be responsible for an additional $1 billion every year as a result of these cuts – and as the Governor has made clear,we simply cannot back-fill these costs.

• At least 25 rural hospitals will be threatened, leaving thousands of Pennsylvanians at risk of losing access to lifesaving care.

• 26,000 Pennsylvania energy jobs will be threatened as the bill raises taxes and harms our energy sector.

All while growing the federal deficit by $3.3 trillion, Shapiro said.

Shapiro disavows GOP

Rep. Rob. Bresnahan, R-Dallas Township, will run for a second 2-year term in 2026. No Democrat has yet announced a challenge to the freshman Congressman.

Shapiro has aggressively gone after the state’s Republican members of Congress who voted for the bill, including Bresnahan.

“Shame on these members of Congress who spent the last few months saying, ‘Oh, I’ll never cut Medicaid,’” Shapiro said during an appearance earlier this month on WILK-FM radio in Wilkes-Barre. “I mean, Rep. Bresnahan told you, your listeners, your newspapers, told me to my face, this was a red line in the sand for him, he wouldn’t harm people on Medicaid, he wouldn’t harm our rural hospitals. He caved and voted for this bill.”

Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee spokesperson Eli Cousin said, “Rep. Bresnahan broke his promise to NEPA voters when he swore he would not gut Medicaid, but instead cast a decisive vote for the largest cuts to Medicaid in history.

“Now JD Vance — who callously dubbed the historic cuts to Medicaid ‘minutiae’ and ‘immaterial’ — is parachuting into Bresnahan’s district in a desperate attempt to try and once again lie to Northeast Pennsylvanians about the devastating impacts this tax scam will have on working families.

“Pennsylvania voters won’t be deceived — Rob Bresnahan cast a politically toxic vote that will kick thousands of his constituents off their health care, jeopardize rural hospitals, and jack up electricity bills — all while he profits off the stock market. It’s why he will be a one-term member of Congress.”