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On Thursday morning, a gleeful GOP celebrated the passing of President Trump’s “Big, Beautiful Bill” by the House. It didn’t come easy — there were a few dissenters — but eventually, fear of Trump’s retribution likely pushed it through.

But it’s a Pyrrhic victory, if a victory at all, and we’re undoubtedly worse off for it.

Trump’s BBB is a massive, larded up spending bill. The federal government is already $1.8 trillion in debt, and this bill adds another $3.8 trillion on top of it, more than doubling the current deficit.

These numbers may sound conceptual, but they have real world consequences for average Americans.

The U.S. debt-to-GDP is now upward of 120% and growing. When we’re leveraged to the hilt like this, we’re likely to get higher interest and Treasury rates, which makes the cost of borrowing more expensive. Home equity loans, mortgage rates, car loans, credit card debt — they could all be more expensive.

Conservatives, who’ve theoretically supported fiscal responsibility as a defining principle, are trashing the bill, and Republicans for passing it.

Rep. Warren Davidson of Ohio posted: “Don’t bankrupt America! Sadly, the big bill grows debt and deficits this Congress, but promises future Congresses will cut spending.” And, “Deficits do matter and this bill grows them now. The only Congress we can control is the one we’re in. Consequently, I cannot support this big deficit plan. NO.”

Conservative economist Joel Griffith wrote, “The ‘Big, Beautiful Bill’ adds another entitlement (government-funded ‘Trump Accounts’), provides a Blue State bailout ($40k SALT deduction), & exempts large amounts of income from payroll tax as programs near insolvency.”

The Wall Street Journal called it a “folly.”

National Review’s Charles C.W. Cooke said, “The Senate should rip it to pieces.”

The garish and profligate spending by Trump’s Republican Party in this bill begged an obvious point, made by several including business writer Carol Roth: “It’s funny how the GOP is only fiscally conservative when they don’t have control of Congress.”

Trump’s BBB will inflict enormous amounts of pain on Americans, who were promised economic prosperity under a Trump administration. So far, thanks to his disastrous overseas tariffs adventures and now this bloated and unruly spending bill, prosperity gets further from us with every passing day.

All of this spending comes on the heels of Trump accepting a $400 million plane from the Qataris.

But there are philosophical consequences, too — namely, the death of conservatism by a thousand cuts.

Over the past decade or so — since the arrival of Trump — the GOP has gradually jettisoned nearly every last conservative principle it once stood on in service of a guy who couldn’t even identify them, from personal responsibility to free markets, limited government to family values, law and order to a strong national defense. That fiscal responsibility has also been a victim of Trump’s political hedonism is just one final wound to the conservative psyche.

The Republican Party has been the historical home for conservatives over decades, but no more. Conservative media, once a proud home to voices like Charles Krauthammer, Jonah Goldberg, and Bill Kristol, now platforms ignorant Trump sycophants who have no use for conservative principles — or principles of any kind.

Conservatives are left stranded in a political wilderness, with nowhere but a flagging — if not collapsing — media ecosystem to tiredly sing its praises.

So where is the conservative’s Martin Luther?

Luther led a Protestant Reformation that aimed to be a check on papal power at a time when people were struggling and suffering. Pope Leo X and Dominican friar Johann Tetzel promoted indulgences — the purchase and sale of salvation — to fund the rebuilding of St. Peter’s Basilica in Rome, with Tetzel popularizing the phrase, “As soon as a coin in the coffer rings, a soul from purgatory springs.”

Luther objected to the church’s profane transactions, the pope’s accumulation of wealth, and exploiting sin to profit from forgiveness: “Why does the pope, whose wealth today is greater than the wealth of the richest Crassus, build the basilica of St. Peter with the money of poor believers rather than with his own money?” asked Luther in his Ninety-five Theses.

Luther’s reforms changed the church forever, and arguably saved it from collapsing under the weight of its own power and avarice.

Will anyone come along to reform the conservative movement? To oppose Trump and Republicans’ bastardization of conservative values? To restore the principles that guided the GOP for a century?

Or will Republicans just keep aiding and abetting Trump’s indulgences, his transactional sellout of American values for profit? If this outrageously unconservative spending bill is any indication, the answer is most certainly the latter.

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(S.E. Cupp is the host of "S.E. Cupp Unfiltered" on CNN.)

©2025 S.E. Cupp. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.