Member Newsletter
Here’s my latest hobby: looking at just how many constituents House Republicans, especially the so called “moderates,” want to strip of their health care coverage. Congressional Republicans are currently in hard negotiations and a game of chicken for how to pay for their big tax cut, which seems to be getting bigger by the day. They want to pay for it by taking away people’s health care coverage. But just how that gets done is the key. As Nicole Lafond pointed out this week, moderate House Republicans are saying they may not be willing to support $880 billion of cuts to Medicaid. But they might be willing to cut one of the major provisions of Obamacare, the so-called Medicaid expansion system, which pays 90% of the cost for states to substantially expand their Medicaid coverage to more people. This is a big part of how Obamacare dramatically reduced the number of people without coverage. It’s not just about the exchanges and the subsidies.
What we haven’t had until recently is good data for how many constituents House moderates are ready to axe. But now the Center for American Progress has mushed together budget and census data to show the number of people who lose coverage by district with each option.
So let’s start with one of my favorites: New York Republican Mike Lawler (NY-17). Under the $880 billion proposal, 42,000 of Lawler’s constituents lose their health care coverage. Under the Obamacare cuts, the number who lose their health care is 25,300. It’s fewer but … more than 25,000 of his constituents lose their health care. It’s even wilder when you look at Nicole Malliotakis (NY-11) just south on Staten Island. Under the big slash, 79,000 of her constituents lose their health care coverage. That’s more than 10% of the people in her district. Under the kinder, gentler slash that Politico says the moderates want, the number is 58,800. Ummm okay, only 8%.
Lemme throw in one more detail. Speaker Mike Johnson? 88,000 lose coverage under the big slash — and 59,800 under the kinder, gentler slash.
Anyway, you can play this fun game too. On this page there’s a searchable database for the losses under the caucus-preferred $880 billion cut. And on this page you have the same for the Obamacare expansion cuts.
Search a rep and spread the word. Nothing is remotely real until you put up the numbers of just how many people lose their coverage to pay for a mammoth tax cut for Elon and the rest of the Mar-a-Lago set.