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In Statement, News

Protect Our Care Statement In Response to GOP Finally Releasing Tax Scam Text

In response to the text of the GOP tax scam – which kicks 13 million people off of their insurance, raises premiums double digits for millions more and cuts Medicare by $25 billion – finally being released, Protect Our Care Campaign Director Brad Woodhouse released the following statement:

“This GOP tax plan was negotiated behind closed doors, and now they’re releasing it as a Friday night news dump on the weekend before the vote because they want this hidden from the American people and only shared with their donors,” said Woodhouse. “They know the American people reject giving tax breaks to billionaires and big corporations at the expense of health care for middle class families. The more people learn about this plan, the worse things will get for its supporters. Thirteen million Americans will lose their insurance, tens of millions more will see their premiums increase by double digits and Medicare will be slashed by $25 billion, all to give a tax break to the wealthiest and corporations..

“After being written in a back room, without hearings, expert input or a bipartisan debate, and passing the Senate in the middle of the night, this bill went through conference in complete secrecy, with Democratic amendments refused and Democratic Members being given just two hours to examine it. And of course, this comes just days after a special election in Alabama where the Trump/GOP agenda was soundly rejected and just a month after GOP electoral losses across the country where healthcare played the dominant role.

“This bill is a mockery of the democratic process  This bill gives the top 0.1% a $200,000 tax break while raising health care premiums for people by 10%. That is indefensible. Any GOP Member of Congress who cares about their constituents’ health care should vote against it.”

Sean England
In Statement

Protect Our Care Statement On Passage of Senate GOP Tax Scam which Guts American Health Care to Give Tax Breaks to Billionaires and Wall Street

In response to the Senate passing the GOP’s Senate tax scam which includes sneaky health care repeal, Protect Our Care Campaign Director Brad Woodhouse released the following statement:

“Today, Senate Republicans and President Trump made their priorities clear: tax breaks for the rich and powerful and big corporations, all of whom are doing just fine in today’s economy, are more important than the health care of millions of Americans,” said Woodhouse.

“Under this bill, 13 million people will have their health coverage ripped away, premiums will skyrocket double digits for millions more, Medicare will be slashed by $25 billion next year alone and older Americans will face an age tax — all so the wealthiest and corporations can get a tax break. And none of the promises which have been made to some members to get their votes, including the passage of the Alexander-Murray stabilization bill, will undo the damage this bill will cause and hiding behind these sham deals is just plain wrong.

“After a year of historically bad poll numbers, rising public support for the Affordable Care Act and election losses in November tied to the issue of health care, Republicans are performing the political equivalent of Harakiri to appease Republican donors who want a fat tax break for themselves and a political win for their party, the health security of millions of Americans be damned in the process. Fortunately, this issue is far from decided and in the ensuing days and weeks Republicans in the House and Senate will be subject to a barrage of ads, calls, events and protests from constituents who will not stand idly by while American health care is sacrificed on the altar of tax breaks for the rich.”

Sean England
In Uncategorized

The GOP Tax Plan is a Triple Punch to Health Care For the Middle Class

Republicans are desperate to pass their tax plan before anyone notices what’s in it. Why?

Three key parts — repealing the mandate, forcing Medicare cuts and cutting deductions for medical expense — are just the latest attempt by Republicans in Washington to attack the health care that middle class families depend on.

The three-pronged assault includes:

Premiums Go Up

Reuters: “Repeal of individual mandate would increase uninsured, premiums: CBO”

Medicare Goes Down

The Hill: “GOP tax bill could spur $25 billion in Medicare cuts: CBO”

Medical Expense Deduction Goes Away

Los Angeles Times: “GOP tax plan would scrap deduction for big medical expenses”

Sean England
In Uncategorized

Protect Our Care Blasts the Trump Administration’s Medicaid Changes as Offensive, Harmful and…

CMS’s New Criteria for State Changes to Medicaid will Deny Coverage to Hundreds of Thousands of Americans

Washington, D.C. — The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) announced today new criteria for considering requests from states to make changes to their Medicaid programs, dropping the previous requirement that such changes must “increase and strengthen” health coverage for low-income Americans and instead encouraging proposals that place new hurdles to coverage like drug tests and work requirements. CMS Administrator Seema Verma, whose agency’s mission is to help Americans access health coverage through Medicare, Medicaid, CHIP and the Health Insurance Marketplace, said in a statement that the goal of covering more people is a “hollow victory of numbers.” This, despite the fact that on its own website homepage CMS promotes that it’s efforts cover 100 million Americans.

Protect Our Care Campaign Director Brad Woodhouse blasted the changes and Verma’s offensive comparison of people gaining access to health care with “hollow” “numbers.”

“The Trump Administration has once again shown that it will stop at nothing in its zeal to sabotage American health care even if it means harming hundreds of thousands of people and resorting to offensive, right-wing stereotypes about low-income Americans in the process,” said Woodhouse. “CMS is supposed to help people get health coverage, but today it offensively called coverage goals a ‘hollow victory of numbers,’ an Orwellian statement from the agency charged with administering Medicare, Medicaid, CHIP and the Health Insurance Marketplace. These changes are shameful, harmful and wreak of the kind of right-wing rhetoric and policy choices that for decades have demeaned and stereotyped people who need health care but can’t afford it. Hundreds of thousands of Americans will lose coverage as a result of these changes — not because they don’t need, deserve or qualify, but because Donald Trump and Republicans want a talking point for their right-wing base. They should be ashamed.”

These changes are the opposite of the message Americans sent to Congress in defeating one effort after another to repeal the Affordable Care Act, which was to improve and expand coverage rather than repeal it. Republican efforts to slash Medicaid and end Medicaid expansion were especially unpopular as countless Americans shared stories of how important access to Medicaid was to them and their families.

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