This week, West Virginians didn’t just get sold out—we got steamrolled. Our U.S. Senators, Shelley Moore Capito and Jim Justice, and Congressman Riley Moore voted for the so-called “One Big Beautiful Bill,” which guts the very programs that keep Hardy County families fed, healthy, and afloat.
Let’s be clear: over 28% of West Virginians—more than half a million people—rely on Medicaid or CHIP, including children, working parents, veterans, and older adults. In Moorefield and across the Potomac Highlands, where healthcare options are already scarce, these cuts will hit hard. Fewer providers, longer wait times, and more people left without basic care—it’s not just bad policy, it’s dangerous.
The bill also slashes SNAP, which over 277,000 West Virginians depend on each month. That includes working families in Hardy, Grant, Pendleton, and Hampshire counties. These are the folks packing chickens at processing plants, tending farms, or running registers—people who work hard but still can’t make ends meet. SNAP doesn’t just help them—it fuels our local economy. Every dollar spent at a grocery store here helps keep small-town businesses alive.
And yet, while cutting food and healthcare assistance, this bill delivers massive tax breaks to billionaires and corporations, adding over $3 trillion to the national debt in the process. That’s not fiscal discipline—it’s a slap in the face to West Virginians.
Congressman Moore says he’s fighting for us. But his vote says otherwise. He sided with political donors over the very families who welcomed him into their communities. If he believes this bill helps West Virginia, he should come to Moorefield and explain to a nurse losing coverage or a grandmother raising her grandkids on SNAP why they had to sacrifice so someone in Palm Beach could get a tax cut.
In one of the poorest, sickest states in America, we need leaders who fight for our dignity—not Wall Street handouts. Out here in Hardy County, there’s nothing “beautiful” about being left behind.
Chandler Goule
Lost City, WV
Member Hardy County
Democratic Committee
