WATCH: Scott Bessent Effortlessly Fact Checks CNN On Big Beautiful Bill

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent effortlessly pushed back on biased questions from CNN’s Dana Bash on the Big Beautiful Bill during an appearance on “State of The Union” Sunday.

Bash, who has a long history of displaying anti-Trump bias, cited an obscure analysis from the Yale Budget Lab in an effort to claim the Big Beautiful Bill will raise taxes on working class Americans. The CNN host claimed, citing the cherry-picked analysis, that the richest Americans will see their income rise by two percent, while the lowest earning Americans will suffer a drop of three percent.

“Well, Dana, first, let’s have a look at the Yale Budget Lab, because I was looking at their findings, and this week I actually went on their website. They’re all ex-Biden officials, so I think we can discount everything they say,” Bessent shot back. 

“I’d encourage all your viewers to look at the composition of both the board and the staff. And it’s just not right that what we have here is a middle class and working class bill. That we, are going to see wages accelerate and we are going to see, just as we saw with President Trump’s first tax bill, we are making permanent these tax cuts.” The treasury secretary further noted that the 2017-18 tax bill gave highest earners a tax increase of eight percent.

“So that’s going to be permanent now. So permanently, the highest 10% will pay a higher percent of the taxes,” he said.

Bessent also fact-checked claims that the bill authorizes massive cuts to Medicaid, which has become a common line of attack from the left. Bash continued with this line of attack by claiming that work requirements for Medicaid assistance constitutes a “change.”

“No, there are no change in benefits .There’s a change in requirements to get the benefits,” Bessent replied without hesitation. “What we are doing is, we are bringing back manufacturing jobs. We are bringing back working class jobs. By securing the border, we have already seen working class wages move up. So we are creating jobs, people can get off Medicaid and get a job that has good healthcare benefits, Dana.”

Bash followed up by claiming that work requirements are unpopular with the American people, including a number of House Republicans. Her claim appears to be without merit, as just two House Republicans voted against the bill, neither of whom did so because of Medicaid exclusively.

“Well, first of all, it’s the Republicans are not the most vocal on this. It is a group of Democrats who unfortunately seem to think that poor people are stupid. I don’t think poor people are stupid. I think they have agency. And I think to have them register twice a year for these benefits, that is not a burden, but these people who want to infantilize the poor and those who need these Medicaid benefits are alarmist,” the treasury secretary shot back.

Bash then attempted to move on by claiming Republicans have historically “wanted to cut red tape and not add more red tape,” though Bessent refused to let her off the hook.

“Well, no, no, no, but we’ve also wanted to put in work requirements, which somehow that was very popular under Bill Clinton, was popular under President Obama, and this Democratic Party blew out the deficit in 2020, and they never want to bring it back. But work requirements even poll well with the median Democratic voter, maybe not the fringe.”

The 1996 Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act, which was signed by then-President Bill Clinton, did indeed institute work requirements for individuals seeking welfare benefits.