Democrats and Republicans have sparred over Democratic demands to address health care issues in a government funding bill, with the standoff leading to the first government shutdown since 2019. We’ll provide the facts on two talking points each side is using to blame the other for the shutdown.
President Joe Biden boasted of a decrease in premiums for Medicare Part B as the “first” reduction “in more than a decade.” That’s true. But he neglected to mention the drop follows a large increase the prior year, partly due to anticipated Alzheimer’s drug expenses, which didn’t actually materialize.
In a Florida speech about senior citizens, President Donald Trump made misleading comparisons of Medicare costs under his administration and his predecessor’s.
President Donald Trump said that by allowing insurers to sell plans across state lines, “your premiums will be down 60 and 70 percent.” We couldn’t find any study supporting such a decrease, and experts we consulted disputed the idea that overall average premiums would decline significantly.
Opponents of the Republican House health care bill are claiming its provisions on preexisting conditions reach further than they actually do.
Democrats have stressed that the GOP’s American Health Care Act would increase health insurance premiums, while Republicans have said it would lower them, both citing the Congressional Budget Office. Which is it? A little of both.
White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer claimed that “because of Obamacare, premiums on everybody have gone up … whether you’re in an employer-based system or not.” Employer premiums have been affected somewhat, but they’ve been growing at historically low rates for several years.
The president distorted the facts on jobs, immigration, health insurance, war spending and more.
It’s a health care edition of Groundhog Friday, featuring repeated claims from Sens. Bernie Sanders and Ted Cruz.
Donald Trump claimed that a 25 percent average increase in premiums on the HealthCare.gov exchanges was a “phony number,” citing instead increases of “60, 70, 80 percent.” But Trump just as easily could have cherry-picked increases in the single digits.