GOP Sen. Josh Hawley Warns Against 'Massive' Medicaid Cuts: 'I Don't Like The Idea'

[BumRushDaShow]

Source: Huff Post

Feb 19, 2025, 06:00 AM EST | Updated 6 hours ago


WASHINGTON ― Republicans in the House are considering big cuts to Medicaid — and that isn’t sitting well with one Republican senator, who’s arguing they’d harm many people who voted for President Donald Trump. “I would not do severe cuts to Medicaid,” Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) told HuffPost in an interview on Tuesday.

He said he agreed with MAGA whisperer Steve Bannon, who warned over the weekend that the right “can’t just take a meat axe” to the program because it also benefits low-income Trump supporters.

Hawley’s objection to carving up Medicaid will be yet another complication for Republicans as they seek to enact Trump’s legislative agenda and extend his 2017 tax cuts. In the House, GOP lawmakers are eyeing massive spending reductions to offset some of the cost of the tax cuts, which they have pegged at $4.5 trillion over 10 years. They’ve signaled these savings measures will include cuts to Medicaid, which pays medical bills for about 72 million low-income Americans, including millions of children.

Senate Republicans, meanwhile, are pushing forward with their own slimmer budget plan that would first boost border security, defense and energy policy, and want to tackle passing tax cuts later on. The two chambers still aren’t any closer to uniting around a singular strategy. Hawley said his fellow Missouri Republican Rep. Jason Smith, the chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee, has “a tough, tough road ahead of him” coming up with nearly $900 billion in spending cuts to help offset the cost of the tax reductions. “I don’t like the idea of massive Medicaid cuts. We should have no Medicare cuts of any kind,” the senator added.

Read more: https://www.huffpost.com/entry/medicaid-cuts-josh-hawley_n_67b53047e4b04083cc99456a

[ruet]

1. I Love How They Just...

put "we don't like it because it hurts us. But if it were them..." right out in the open.

[groundloop]

2. offset the cost of tax reductions (for the billionaire class)

I'm sure they'll throw in some tiny tax cuts for everyone, just to placate the magats, but look at all the lost government services we'll suffer just so our oligarchs can pay even less than they already do.

And isn't it ironic to hear Hawley arguing for Medicaid?

[IronLionZion]

3. Are they going to check voter registrations when they make the cuts?

MAGA voters exempt from leopards eating their face?

[bronxiteforever]

4. Even their objections to TSF's policy use mealy mouth words

“I don’t like the idea”
“I would not do severe cut”

[displacedvermoter]

5. I would hate like hell to have to rely on

Josh Hawley as an ally on a fight to protect Medicaid, or anything else for that matter.

[Linda ladeewolf]

8. Hawley is only

Against it because so many people in Missouri are on it! He wouldn’t want to face that kind of pressure, he knows the people well enough to know what might happen.

[displacedvermoter]

10. I am betting he folds like a cheap lawn chair come time to

vote on it. He just got reelected and the rubes back home will have six years to forget his treachery. Just watch.

[Linda ladeewolf]

11. Not taking that bet.

He was the wimp running from the rioters on J6! He’s one of the biggest chickens I’ve ever seen. He is right though, his constituents have longer memories when it concerns them personally. Other people not so much.

[PlanetBev]

13. That's exactly what he is going to do

Another “concerned and troubled” sycophant with a pant load. Thank you for reminding us of his free-style sprint through the halls of Congress on January 6th. Chicken is an understatement.

[malthaussen]

6. Well, then, I guess you'll be voting against, eh, Josh? Josh? n/t

[Raven123]

7. Votes speak louder than words. We shall see.

[C0RI0LANUS]

9. Republican leadership at its best. The GOP exploits class warfare, then realizes they need poor voters.

[dalton99a]

12. Many low-income cult members on pain meds have transportation and ammunition

[Delarage]

20. Yup

He'll have to run even faster this time. He should start working with a track and field coach so he has a chance

[Clouds Passing]

14. Are your private health insurance, private hospitals and private health clinics throwing a little fit about losing

their gravy train, little joshy?!

[IcyPeas]

15. Make no mistake:

If this would only affect low income democrats he'd be fine with it.

He said he agreed with MAGA whisperer Steve Bannon, who warned over the weekend that the right “can’t just take a meat axe” to the program because it also benefits low-income Trump supporters.

[4catsmom]

16. "I don't like the idea"

But I will support it because I March lockstep with Trump

[cstanleytech]

17. Our leadership should be hammering the Republicans that cutting anything is gross negligence.

Because there should be no need to cut anything if the tax cuts for the wealthy and corporations will pay for themselves like they've claimed.

[kwolf68]

18. Im guessing

Wimp Josh is getting calls from his Republican constituents who are not good with this. If a scamp like Hawley isn't on board you know it's a fucked situation.

[Akoto]

19. My pain management specialist and I were discussing this today.

For the record, he is very much anti-Trump and even more so anti-Musk.

I'm on medications which are either dependency forming, expensive, or both. As such, I told him that my family was concerned about what would happen if current government actions cost me my SSI or Medicaid. He did not personally believe they would be cut to that extent, if at all, because it would be absolute chaos. Half of his patients would have no way to continue their treatment. I told him that was my thinking exactly, which is why I was talking to him now about withdrawal.

Again, because he has some hope that cutting these programs would be a step too far (hitting MAGA as much as everyone else), we agreed not to withdraw for now. However, if anything should happen, he's promised me a weaning plan and replacement with the best non-habit forming medications he can arrange.

I'd like to be as lighthearted as others about why Hawley is raising this issue, but as a physically disabled person who only has this much bodily sanity because of SSI and Medicaid, I can't manage a laugh here. It's really dire, serious stuff for a lot of people.

[augyboston]

22. No Humanity in Hawley or Bannon or MAGATS, it is all about political power.

There is absolutely no humanity in any of these greed driven power hungry clowns.

Do any of them think about the human costs of slashing or eliminating Medicaid?!? Does the image of a poor child dying needlessly bother them at all?!? No, it is only the political impact and the potential loss of power that they're concerned with.

These people have no conscience at all, as in zero, zilch, nada.