White House Says GOP Budget A Disaster For Women

President Barack Obama and Vice President Joe Biden
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The Obama administration is hoping for a Friday three-fer.

Amid a political fight over women’s rights that has caused GOP support among women to collapse; a Friday jobs report expected to show that the economy continues to grow rapidly; and an election year fight over the Republican Party’s controversial budget, the White House will host a forum on women and the economy — to highlight the administration’s accomplishments in the area of women’s rights, particularly in contrast with the Republican Party’s governing platform.

The goal is to capitalize on all three simultaneously.

On Thursday, three senior administration officials walked reporters through the event, which will be paired with the release of a new report from the White House Council on Women and Girls — and made clear that a key purpose of the roll-out is to draw a contrast with the GOP.

In particular, the officials highlighted the impact the Republican budget would have on domestic programs that disproportionately benefit women — including its call to repeal the controversial health care law.

Assuming the GOP’s proposed cuts to discretionary spending are distributed evenly, noted one of the officials, “1.8 million pregnant and post-partem women would lose their benefits. One-hundred thousand would lose their support from food. Something like education: $2.7 billion cut, that would cause the loss of jobs of 38,000 teachers and their aides, disproportionately women.”

In the area of the three major entitlements, Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security, the story’s much the same. “Women represent the majority of Medicare beneficiaries. Fifty-six percent of Medicare beneficiaries are women. So anything bad you do to Medicare is going to disproportionately hurt women,” the official said. “Taking an unbalanced approach to Social Security will disproportionately hurt women because they live two years longer, because they benefit from the progressive benefit formula that gives you a proportionately larger benefit if you’re lower-wage.”

And despite polls indicating the health care law remains a political loser for Democrats, the White House won’t shy away from touting its benefits for women.

“One of the things that’s outlawed under the Affordable Care Act is the practice of women being charged more on premiums — up to 130 percent,” said another official. “[Repealing] it would be devastating for women.”

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