WASHINGTON – July Fourth festivities in the nation’s capital have included more than the usual dose of military spectacle this year, as the Freedom 250 initiative from the White House celebrates the role America’s armed forces have played over the nation’s first 250 years.
But some veterans see hypocrisy, given the deep cuts over the past year to Medicaid, food stamps and Department of Veterans Affairs staffing that have impacted services for those who served in uniform.
“How good is our military? Iran was finished in one week, Venezuela in one hour,” President Donald Trump said at a kickoff rally to open the Great American State Fair on the National Mall, an event punctuated by supersonic fighter jet flyovers. “How good is our Air Force? Those are serious planes.”
Semiquincentennial celebrations have attracted controversy since Trump wrested control of the major events from a bipartisan congressional commission with a similar name, America 250.
The military is on full display at the “state fair,” with pavilions showcasing industries and attractions from all but a handful of Democratic states that snubbed the event. National Guard troops and others are staffing information tents and recruitment booths.
Visitors can put on camouflage face paint and take selfies in a “Department of War” tent, bearing the name Trump and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth use to refer to the Department of Defense.
A Military and Veterans Appreciation Day featured military band performances and a display of robotic dogs and bomb defusal tools.
Yet for all the public expressions of admiration, some Trump administration policies have put some veterans at risk of losing health coverage or food aid. And staffing cuts at the VA have created serious concerns.
The One Big Beautiful Bill Act that Trump signed July 4, 2025, introduced new restrictions on Medicaid, which provides health care for low-income Americans, and the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, widely called food stamps.
Roughly 1.6 million veterans are on Medicaid, according to KFF, a healthcare research nonprofit formerly called the Kaiser Family Foundation.
Roughly 1.2 million veterans are on food stamps, according to the left-leaning Center on Budget and Policy Priorities.
Work requirements were already in place for food stamps but until last September, veterans were exempt. The new law ended that exemption.
The federal law also created new Medicaid work requirements. Starting Jan. 1, 2027, nearly all recipients ages 19 to 64 must log 80 hours per month of work or training to keep their eligibility.
There’s an exemption for disabled veterans, though it may take a 100% disability rating to qualify.
“However that is interpreted, it’s going to be more narrow than the large group of veterans who are relying on Medicaid coverage,” said Leo Cuello, a Georgetown University professor who studies Medicaid law and policy, adding that many veterans “should have gotten an exception to the work requirement, but will not.”
The law also allows an exemption from the Medicaid work rules for anyone deemed “medically frail.” But in June, Medicaid officials issued guidelines indicating that a person would have to be too weak to work, suggesting that even a cancer diagnosis would not trigger the exemption.
Cuello said the burden of proving 80 hours of work per month will disproportionately affect veterans.
“Many workers get tripped up by the work requirement because they’re unable to prove they’re working,” he said. “If you think about veterans who are self-employed, or who are mowing lawns in their neighborhood, or who are part of the gig economy, they will have trouble proving their work, and therefore, in many cases, lose their health insurance.”
The work requirement will also hit vulnerable populations especially hard.
“Veterans are more likely to have chronic conditions, mental health conditions and substance use disorder conditions. They’re also more likely to be older and have a lot of age-related chronic conditions,” Cuello said.
On June 29, Arizona and two dozen other states led by Democrats sued the Trump administration over the Medicaid work requirements.
“Medicaid exists to protect the most vulnerable Arizonans, and this interim final rule unlawfully undermines that protection,” said Arizona Attorney General Kris Mayes in a statement. “It ignores the law and puts medically frail people at risk of losing the healthcare they depend on.”
The White House has defended the law, including the elements that limit benefits to those unable to work. The law’s tax provisions will spur growth, the White House says, and it “creates opportunity for all Americans, particularly our nation’s veterans.”
The law included trillions of dollars in tax cuts, financed by deep cuts to the social safety net and clean energy incentives. The tax cuts were across the board but skewed toward high earners. The law slashes Medicaid spending by almost $1 trillion over 10 years, a 12% reduction.
The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office estimated that by 2034, the law will have increased the number of people without health insurance by 10 million.
During his first term, Trump signed legislation that expanded veterans’ access to medical care and education benefits in specific circumstances. He also ordered student debt forgiveness for disabled veterans.
The effort to slash the federal workforce early in Trump’s second term, led by Elon Musk, included deep cuts at the VA, affecting researchers studying cancer treatment and addiction and staff at health centers.
A report commissioned by Senate Democrats estimated that the VA lost more than 40,000 employees in Trump’s first eight months back in office, including nurses, physicians and psychologists.
VA officials have offered assurances that care won’t be impacted but critics say that the cost-cutting has led to increased wait times, particularly for mental health care.
Raymond Holliday, a retired Marine from Orange County, California, said his VA case officer was temporarily furloughed during the chaotic layoffs. Holliday was applying for vocational readiness and employment benefits to fund his education.
“It was very stressful,” he said. “You would get an automated message back that didn’t even give a date for response. … You feel a lot of hopelessness, and you sort of feel like a little bit of betrayal from big government, and you feel scared.”
Morgan Finkelstein, an advocate with Protect Our Care Arizona, which advocates for federal healthcare benefits, said there’s no question that Trump-era cuts have reduced services for veterans.
“Veterans, in particular, have benefited in the past from increased behavioral healthcare coverage and services,” he said. “All we’re going to see from cutting funding is clinics closing” and veterans having trouble finding and accessing care.
Trump’s backers reject the complaints.
Michael Nudo, federal legislative liaison at Concerned Veterans For America, a conservative group, said the law’s tax provisions have helped small businesses, of which 1.6 million are owned by veterans, according to the Small Business Administration.
“So many veteran small business owners have said because of these tax benefits that they receive now, they’ve been able to do things like reinvest in their company and develop and improve their company, and research and development in ways that they otherwise wouldn’t have been able to,” Nudo said.
Republish our articles for free, online or in print, under a Creative Commons license.
