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The Governor, Senate, and House have all released their proposed supplemental budgets. The final weeks of session will be spent reconciling these budgets into a final agreement. These budgets are highly influenced by recent federal actions. On July 4, 2025, President Trump signed the “Big Beautiful Bill” (HR 1) into law. The impacts of this bill will go into effect over the next 5 years. While the impacts of HR 1 are widespread, our analysis focuses on the changes to SNAP and Medicaid.
We are deeply concerned about the impact of these changes on people with low incomes in Washington state. At the same time, these changes are creating substantial challenges for our state’s budget:
- States will be required to pay more to provide the same, and sometimes lower, benefits.
- Individuals will have an increased burden of “proof” to maintain eligibility for programs. This red tape will lead to thousands of families losing access to food and medical care. It will also cost the state much more to run these programs because more staff and tech upgrades are needed to check these new eligibility restrictions and work requirements.
- Many immigrants and refugees will lose access to federal programs and turn to state-funded programs that mirror SNAP and Medicaid to meet their basic needs.
Taken together these three factors are increasing the deficit at the state level, which puts pressure on other state-funded programs and services. This budget starts to restructure Washington’s finances to adapt to the rippling effects of HR1 in coming years. While we always fight for progress on anti-poverty priorities, this year our main goal is to avoid cuts and protect basic services for Washingtonians:
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