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- Faith leaders plan Southern protest over budget cuts: 'What we will not do is stand down'</p>
<p>Deborah Barfield Berry, USA TODAY July 14, 2025 at 7:05 AM</p>
<p>WASHINGTON, D.C. ‒ Faith leaders plan to launch demonstrations July 14 in congressional districts across the South to protest federal budget cuts they say will devastate America's poor.</p>
<p>Earlier this month, Congress passed President Donald Trump's "One Big, Beautiful Bill,'' a spending plan that includes tax cuts but also deep reductions to Medicaid ‒ the federal/state health insurance program for low-income people ‒ and the food stamp benefits program.</p>
<p>"We are not going to allow the damage, destruction and death that will be created by this budget ‒ (this) big, ugly budget ‒ to go away from the headlines or for people not to be seen,'' Bishop William J. Barber, II, president of Repairers of the Breach, a social justice organization, told reporters. "And so we're going to the South."</p>
<p>Bishop William J. Barber, II, walks in front of a group of religious leaders who blocked traffic outside the US Capitol June 30, 2025 and prayed until they were arrested</p>
<p>The campaign will kick off July 14 with protests planned in 11 states, including Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas and West Virginia.</p>
<p>Protestors plan to demonstrate outside congressional district offices carrying caskets with statistics of the number of people expected to be harmed by the cuts.</p>
<p>Organizers said the focus on the South is in part because many people who will be impacted live in the region. Southern states had poverty rates of 15%, according to recent U.S. Census Bureau data.</p>
<p>"Yet the South is the place where every U.S. senator, every U.S. senator, except one in North Carolina, voted for this big, bad, ugly, deadly, destructive bill,'' Barber said. "They voted against their own people.''</p>
<p>President Donald Trump bangs a gavel after signing the "One, Big Beautiful Bill" Act into law during an Independence Day military family picnic on the South Lawn of the White House on July 4, 2025, in Washington, D.C.</p>
<p>Republican lawmakers have said many federal programs are bloated and that cuts and other changes are necessary to prevent fraud and abuse.</p>
<p>House Majority Leader Steve Scalise, a Republican from Louisiana, praised passage of the bill saying it delivers on promises made to voters.</p>
<p>"You will see an American renaissance, a golden age in this country that we haven't seen in generations,'' he said in a video released July 8. "And we will get this economy moving again."</p>
<p>For weeks, Barber and others have held "Moral Monday'' protests at the U.S. Capitol to draw attention to the negative impact of federal cuts. Barber and other protestors have been arrested at the Capitol Hill protests.</p>
<p>"What we will not do is stand down or bow down,'' Barber said.</p>
<p>House Speaker Mike Johnson is congratulated by fellow congressional Republicans after signing the One Big Beautiful Bill Act at the U.S. Capitol on July 3, 2025.</p>
<p>Nationwide, between 12 million and 20 million people could lose Medicaid, according to two estimates. Medicaid provides health insurance for 20% of Americans, including 40% of children and 25% of adults with disabilities, and covers nursing home costs for 60% of residents.</p>
<p>More than 2 million people could lose Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), the food assistance program.</p>
<p>Rev. Alexis Carter Thomas, the convenor of Moral Mondays in Greenville, South Carolina, said protestors there will deliver a casket Monday to the office of Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham.</p>
<p>"We have a moral obligation to stand up to speak out and fight back against this death-dealing legislation,'' she said.</p>
<p>Contributing: Sarah Wire</p>
<p>This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Faith leaders slam budget bill, saying cuts are harmful to poor</p>
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