In a Florida speech about senior citizens, President Donald Trump made misleading comparisons of Medicare costs under his administration and his predecessor’s.
Trump’s Misleading Medicare Boast
Issues: premiums
Selling Insurance Across State Lines
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.
Preexisting Condition Spin
Opponents of the Republican House health care bill are claiming its provisions on preexisting conditions reach further than they actually do.
Premium Spin
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.
Employer Premiums and the ACA
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.
Trump’s Address to Congress
The president distorted the facts on jobs, immigration, health insurance, war spending and more.
Groundhog Friday
It’s a health care edition of Groundhog Friday, featuring repeated claims from Sens. Bernie Sanders and Ted Cruz.
Still Cherry-Picking Premiums
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.
Clinton’s Shaky Cost-Shifting Claim
Hillary Clinton claimed that private insurance premiums have “gone up so much” in some states that didn’t expand Medicaid because hospitals shifted their costs for providing emergency care for the uninsured. But we have found no data to support that claim, and the idea that such cost shifting occurs is debated.
Slower Premium Growth Under Obama
Republicans say the average family health insurance premium has increased by $4,154 under President Obama. That’s right — and it’s a much slower rate of growth than under President George W. Bush.