President Donald Trump plans to halt payments to health insurance companies serving the poorest customers on the Obamacare exchanges, the White House announced Thursday.
Trump has threatened to withhold these funds, valued at $7 billion this year, since shortly after his election victory last November. The threats alone have roiled the health insurance market, and if he follows through, it promises to be significantly disruptive. Trump will make an announcement Friday, according to Politico, which first reported the news.By taking this step, the moron thinks he's getting "leverage" with Democrats:
The Democrats ObamaCare is imploding. Massive subsidy payments to their pet insurance companies has stopped. Dems should call me to fix!— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) October 13, 2017
With this action, and the action taken yesterday to allow cheap, shorter term "no-surance," Rump is going against the wishes of the vast majority of Americans who want the Affordable Care Act continued and improved, not gutted. From the Kaiser Health Tracking Poll:
A large share of Americans (78 percent) think President Trump and his administration should do what they can to make the current health care law work while few (17 percent) say they should do what they can to make the law fail so they can replace it later.He still apparently thinks he can force Democrats to go along with a repeal of the Affordable Care Act, while shifting the blame for any disruptions or pain to Democrats. Here's Jonathan Chait's take on that:
The trouble is that every plan Trump has supported would throw even more people off their insurance than his sabotage would. There is no political or policy incentive for them [Democrats] to give him political cover for policies to deny Americans health insurance. Their incentive is to highlight the sabotage that he is boasting about, and fight.
The Medicaid expansion, which accounts for a majority of the law’s coverage gains, remains in place and is not vulnerable to administrative sabotage. Individual consumers are going to experience a lot of financial pain as a result of Trump’s action. As premiums rise in response to the sabotage, the main public recourse will be to replace the Republican-led government with one capable of passing a workable and humane health-care law. (our emphasis)While we eagerly await Democrats' highlighting the Rump- and- Republican sabotage and the opportunity to vote this collection of nihilist, vicious goons out of office, some States are already setting up a firewall to protect the subsidies, New York and California for starters. The same groups that opposed Republican efforts to repeal the Act can be counted on to push back on this latest piece of cruelty. Not only is this is a war we can win, it's a war we must win.
Once again into the breach: Especially, if you have a Republican Senator or Congresscritter, first of all our condolences, but please call their office and tell them you want the cost- sharing reduction payments made under the Affordable Care Act. Look them up here and here. Thank you!
BONUS: "Chuck and Nancy," hopefully chastened by the latest act of Rumpian double- dealing and sabotage, issued a joint statement:
“Sadly, instead of working to lower health costs for Americans, it seems President Trump will singlehandedly hike Americans’ health premiums. It is a spiteful act of vast, pointless sabotage leveled at working families and the middle class in every corner of America. Make no mistake about it, Trump will try to blame the Affordable Care Act, but this will fall on his back and he will pay the price for it.
“President Trump has apparently decided to punish the American people for his inability to improve our health care system. Trumpcare collapsed because Americans overwhelmingly recognized the cruelty and higher costs it meant for them and their loved ones. Now, millions of hard-working American families will suffer just because President Trump wants them to.
“If these reports are true, the President is walking away from the good faith, bipartisan Alexander-Murray negotiations and risking the health care of millions of Americans.”"If these reports are true..." Really, now.
BONUS: Charles Pierce on the vile people going along with this --
This is a philosophical revulsion against the very idea of a social safety net. The president* may be acting out of id-based contempt and bone-deep ignorance. But the support he's getting for his actions from all the people who otherwise are laughing at him behind his back and hoping that he doesn't start World War III in such a way that it can be hung on them in the next election is deliberate and calculated. It is a premeditated catastrophe visited on people whom Paul Ryan believes in the darkness of his soul and in the shadows of his mind do not deserve the help of the government of which they are a part. They just found a useful hatchetman to serve an agenda of ruthless sadism.(Image: The damage a "f*cking moron" with a pen can do.)
