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Telegraph
34 minutes ago
- Telegraph
Trump wants to rip $800bn out of Medicaid. It will punish Maga's poorest
Teresa Mcnab had just come back from taking their 11-year-old daughter to school when she heard her husband fall. She found him seizing on the floor. Jackie had been suffering from blood clots, and despite Mcnab's attempts to resuscitate him while waiting for the ambulance, he was later confirmed dead. He was just 45. 'We had been together for 20 years,' she says. Mcnab and her daughter Faye had to raise funds in order to pay for his burial, at one point selling lemonade to help cover the costs of his gravestone. But one small solace came from Jackie's hospital bills being covered by America's public health insurance programme for people on low incomes, otherwise known as Medicaid. For people like Trump supporter Mcnab in Knox County, Kentucky, this kind of support is vital to keep the threat of financial ruin at bay. It also demonstrates the importance of Medicaid in the poorest parts of rural America. However, that lifeboat may be about to be pulled away as part of Donald Trump's 'big, beautiful bill'. Under the president's proposal, which he wants lawmakers to pass by Friday, July 4, up to $800bn (£600bn) will be cut from the Medicaid budget to help fund $3.7 trillion in tax cuts. Crucially, this will mean that 16m people will lose health insurance by 2034 compared with current projections, according to the Congressional Budget Office (CBO). And while the bill has been hailed by many on the Right as a tool to boost household income, there are growing fears that Trump's healthcare cuts will target the low-income families who helped to propel him back into the White House. Of the 200 counties with the highest proportion of voters reliant on public health insurance, a staggering 84pc voted for Trump in last year's election. Nowhere exemplifies this contradiction more than Knox County, where 72pc of people backed the Republican presidential candidate. Here, 68pc of the population use some form of public health insurance, and of the 3,142 counties in America, it is one of the top 20 poorest. 'Voters would be mad' These sorts of figures highlight the political risks posed to Trump if he succeeds in passing his healthcare cuts, which edged one step closer on Saturday as Senate Republicans voted narrowly to advance the bill. Steve Bannon, Trump's former chief strategist, has already sounded the alarm by claiming the bill won't succeed 'because Maga is on Medicaid'. However, veteran pollster Frank Luntz says hardcore Trump supporters will back him regardless. 'They'll support whatever he says or does, even cutting their benefits, if they think it will help make America great again,' says Luntz. Though he admits the same may not be true for wavering working-class voters who voted for Trump. 'If there are actual, real, meaningful cuts to Medicaid that voters could see and feel, these voters would be mad,' Luntz adds. 'The Democrats have zero credibility claiming Trump is destroying the economy. But if voters can see and feel the Medicaid cuts, that changes the political calculus completely.' Public health insurance began in America in 1965, when President Lyndon Johnson launched the Medicaid and Medicare programmes. Medicare is a programme for over-65s that is federally funded, whereas Medicaid is an initiative for low-income individuals funded jointly by states and the federal government. Until Barack Obama passed the Affordable Care Act (ACA) in 2010, however, most low-income, non-disabled adults were not eligible for Medicaid unless they had children. Even then, the median income eligibility for parents was just 64pc of the federal poverty line, which as of last year represented an annual income of $15,060. The ACA later allowed states to expand Medicaid provision to adults whose incomes were less than 138pc of the federal poverty line. Since these measures were rolled out, the number of uninsured Americans has plunged from 44m to 25m, expanding healthcare coverage significantly across the country. Trump's bill could change all of that. The president is planning to cut $793bn from Medicaid's budget over 10 years, delivering a hammer blow to states such as Kentucky. According to research firm KFF, the state will miss out on $21bn in federal funding as a result of the bill, while 277,000 people will lose access to health insurance. The bill's largest cost-saving measure is the introduction of a new 80-hours-per-month work requirement for adults who receive Medicaid under the ACA expansion. This will claw back $344bn, it is estimated, while the bill will also save $64bn by requiring these adults to redetermine their eligibility every six months instead of every 12. Darren Bullock, 40, is a Trump voter who switched from the Democrats in 2016. He is likely to lose Medicaid coverage because of the new requirements, although he is not hopeful of finding adequate employment. 'If they want people to work 80 hours a month, they'd need to bring in a lot more jobs,' he says. In rural areas like Knox County, a key barrier for people to finding work is logistics. Bullock might be able to find a job, but he will struggle to get there. He does not own a mobile phone or a car, and there is no public transport. Jennifer Tolbert, the director of state health reform at KFF and deputy director of the firm's Medicaid programme, warns that people aged 55 to 64 who have taken early retirement from physical jobs are the most vulnerable. 'They probably just can't work those jobs any more,' says Tolbert, who adds that they are also in an age bracket that means they are more likely to need healthcare. Tolbert also warns that many people who can meet the work requirements will lose Medicaid simply because of the new burden of paperwork. This includes Mcnab, now 42 and widowed for four years, who gets up at 4.30am every day to work as a full-time cook. She will have no problem meeting the 80-hour work requirement, but she has little time to spare for extra paperwork. 'I take care of my daughter, I take care of my 78-year-old mom, I take care of our home, and half the time I don't even have time for myself,' she says. Another major question is the impact of Medicaid cuts on drug rehabilitation programmes. Chris Ross, 39, is a former drug addict whose life was brought to a 'screeching halt' by substance abuse, as he fell victim to Kentucky's opioid crisis and became homeless. He was just one of many. 'We are plagued with substance abuse,' says Daniel Phipps, the secretary of the Appalachian Restoration Project, which runs drug rehab programmes and helps recovering addicts back into work. It was one of Phipps's programmes that helped to get Ross clean six years ago. He is now married, has custody of his children and works as the project's court liaison. Like the vast majority of the project's patients, his care was funded by Medicaid. 'If I hadn't had Medicaid, I would probably still be homeless,' he says. The public health insurance programme is the bedrock of the project's business, Phipps adds. The Republican bill does exempt people who have a substance use disorder or are participating in rehabilitation programmes from the new work requirements. But the cuts could hit rehab programmes in other ways, says Tolbert. For example, drug addicts may lose their coverage because they cannot meet the reporting requirements, or federal funding cuts will lead to states cutting back on payments for rehab providers. Overall, Tolbert says regional hospitals that cater to low-income communities will be hit hard financially as more people become uninsured, with many set to cut back on staff or services. The political consequences of such changes could be far-reaching. In Knox County, voting Republican is entrenched in the local culture, although such drastic healthcare cuts will no doubt force some people to think again.
Sky News
an hour ago
- Sky News
Elon Musk steps up attacks on Trump once again - as the president fights back
Elon Musk has stepped up his attacks on Donald Trump's sweeping tax and spending bill - weeks after a spectacular fallout between the world's richest man and the US president. Following weeks of relative silence after clashing with Mr Trump over his "big beautiful bill", the billionaire vowed to unseat politicians who support it. In a post on X, Musk said those who had campaigned on cutting spending but then backed the bill "should hang their heads in shame". He added: "And they will lose their primary next year if it is the last thing I do on this Earth." Musk also threatened to put their faces on a poster which said "liar" and "voted to increase America's debt" by $5trn (£3.6trn). The posts attracted a swift reply from Mr Trump, who claimed the billionaire "may get more subsidy than any human being in history" for his electric car business. "Without subsidies, Elon would probably have to close up shop and head back home to South Africa," he wrote on Truth Social. "No more Rocket launches, Satellites, or Electric Car Production, and our Country would save a FORTUNE. Perhaps we should have DOGE take a good, hard, look at this? BIG MONEY TO BE SAVED!!!" 0:46 Musk spent at least $250m (£182m) supporting Mr Trump in his presidential campaign and then led the newly formed Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), which sacked about 120,000 federal employees. He has argued the legislation would greatly increase the US national debt and wipe out the savings he claimed he achieved through DOGE. As the Senate discussed the package, Musk called it "utterly insane and destructive". The Tesla and SpaceX CEO said the bill's massive spending indicated "we live in a one-party country - the PORKY PIG PARTY!!" "Time for a new political party that actually cares about the people," he wrote. Musk previously said some of his social media posts during his dramatic fallout with Mr Trump "went too far". He had shared a series of posts on X, including one that described Mr Trump's tax and spending bill as a "disgusting abomination". He also claimed, in a since-deleted post, that the president . But Musk later wrote: "I regret some of my posts about President @realDonaldTrump last week. They went too far."
Reuters
an hour ago
- Reuters
Landmark EU tech rules holding back innovation, Google says
BRUSSELS, July 1 (Reuters) - Alphabet's (GOOGL.O), opens new tab Google will on Tuesday warn EU antitrust regulators and its critics that landmark European Union rules aimed at reining in Big Tech are hampering innovation to the detriment of European users and businesses. The U.S. tech giant will also urge regulators to give more detailed guidance to help it comply with the rules, and ask its critics to provide evidence of costs and benefits to prove their case. Google is under pressure to address charges under the EU's Digital Markets Act that it favours its own services such as Google Shopping, Google Hotels and Google Flights over rivals. The charges may result in fines of as much as 10% of its global annual revenue. Earlier this month, Google proposed more changes to its search results to better showcase rival products, but critics say these still do not ensure a level playing field. "We remain genuinely concerned about real world consequences of the DMA, which are leading to worse online products and experiences for Europeans," Google's lawyer Clare Kelly will tell a workshop organised by the European Commission to give Google critics the opportunity to seek clarifications. She will say changes implemented by Google to date after discussions with the Commission and its critics have resulted in European users paying more for travel tickets as they cannot directly access airline sites, according to a copy of her speech seen by Reuters. Kelly will also say European airlines, hotels and restaurants have reported up to a 30% loss in direct booking traffic, while users have complained about clunky workarounds. Google's other lawyer, Oliver Bethell, will ask regulators to spell out in detail what the company needs to do, and critics to come up with hard evidence. "If we can understand precisely what compliance looks like, not just in theory, but taking account of on the ground experience, we can launch compliant services quickly and confidently across the EEA," he will say. The EEA is the 27 EU countries, Iceland, Liechtenstein and Norway. "We need help identifying the areas where we should focus. That means bringing real evidence of costs and benefits that we can take account of with the Commission," Bethell said. The day-long workshop starts at 0700 GMT.
