The politics of cutting Medicaid isn’t lost on Trumpworld.
Some in President Donald Trump’s orbit are privately warning House Republicans against gutting the government health insurance program for low-income and disabled Americans in their reconciliation bill.
Doing so could erode support among Trump’s base, and Republicans leading negotiations on the Hill are aware of the concerns.
“The House Republicans who are obsessed with cutting Medicaid are in danger of unwittingly breaking up the coalition Trump created,” one Trumpworld source told NOTUS. “The Republican Party has lost a portion of its college-educated supporters and has increased greatly with voters without a college education who rely more on entitlements.”
“Leave it to House Republicans to screw up a two-car processional,” another operative close to Trumpworld told NOTUS. “Like, they just can’t get out of their own way, sometimes.”
A White House official previously told NOTUS that House Republicans would pitch Medicaid cuts as a way to pay for the reconciliation bill, but wouldn’t provide specifics. The official pointed to how Trump never campaigned on cutting Medicaid, but rather on just rooting out the “waste, fraud and abuse” in the system. Still, Trump and the White House supported the budget resolution, which sets up significant cuts to Medicaid.
Congressional Republicans passed a budget resolution that instructs the House Committee on Energy and Commerce to reduce the deficit over the next 10 years by at least $880 billion. Lawmakers cannot meet that level in spending cuts without significantly touching Medicaid and the Children’s Health Insurance Program, according to the Congressional Budget Office.
Congressional Republicans have publicly backed adding work requirements to Medicaid and targeting “waste, fraud and abuse” — but those proposals would only account for a small percentage of the cuts needed to meet the budget’s instructions. Some Republicans are pushing a proposal that would slash the federal government’s contribution to Medicaid, requiring states to pick up a larger portion of the cost. However, there isn’t a consensus around that proposal.
People close to the White House are now fretting that any severe cuts to Medicaid could hurt Trump politically, given the inroads he made with working-class voters.
Some Trump allies, like Steve Bannon, have made this argument publicly.
“A lot of MAGAs on Medicaid,” Bannon said on his podcast earlier this year. “If you don’t think so, you are dead wrong. You can’t just take a meat axe to it.”
Vulnerable Republicans, too, have been urging GOP leadership not to put drastic cuts to Medicaid on the House floor.
In a letter sent to leadership earlier in April, a group of moderate Republicans, led by Rep. David Valadao, sought to “reiterate our strong support for this program that ensures our constituents have reliable healthcare. Balancing the federal budget must not come at the expense of those who depend on these benefits for their health and economic security.”
It’s not just the vulnerable members who have to worry if the party goes through with this, these Trumpworld sources say, however.
“I think it creates problems, like literal problems,” a third source close to the White House said. “It probably puts a few seats they don’t want on the map, on the map. Again, because it doesn’t really tackle any of the consumer aspects of Obamacare, I don’t think it solves a political problem for the folks who are most hungry to see Obamacare repeal.”
“The president has run up historic margins in rural parts of the country that are disproportionately reliant on Medicaid,” the source said. “So I think that’s something to consider.”
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Reese Gorman is a reporter at NOTUS.