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The Democratic Party primary continues today, but former vice president and frontrunner Joe Biden is showing no signs of reaching out to his party’s left flank on one of its signature issues.
On the eve of primaries in Michigan and five other states, where he could all but clinch the nomination with a good performance in the Midwest, Biden sat for an interview with MSNBC’s Lawrence O’Donnell. Biden was presented with a hypothetical scenario: if he were president and a compromise version of Medicare for All came to his desk, would he veto it?
“I would veto anything that delays providing a security and certainty of healthcare being available now,” Biden responded. “If they got that through by some miracle, or there was an epiphany that occurred, and it passed, then you’ve got to look at the cost. I want to know how they found the $35 trillion. What’s that doing? Is that going to significantly raise taxes on the middle class, which it will. What’s going to happen?”
Biden has frequently argued against Medicare for All, based on the principle that people would be forced off their employer plans, and has implied that they would lose their insurance during the transition to a universal plan. Sanders has maintained that his bill would leave no one uncovered for any amount of time.
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An email to the Biden campaign seeking clarification on his comments wasn’t immediately returned, nor was an email to the Sanders campaign seeking comment.
“Look, my opposition isn’t to the principle that we should have Medicare. Healthcare should be a right in America,” Biden said. “My opposition relates to whether or not, a, it’s doable, and 2, what the cost is and what the consequences for the rest of the budget are.”
“How are you going to find $35 trillion over the next ten years without having profound impacts on everything from taxes for working and middle class people, as well as the rest of the budget?” he added.
A study by the libertarian think tank Mercatus, which was cited by Biden frequently during the primary debates, said that Sanders’ plan would cost $32 trillion over the course of 10 years. An analysis by the left-wing think tank People’s Policy Project, however, found that the plan would save over $2 trillion in national health care expenditures.
Biden’s opposition to something resembling single-payer hasn’t always been so fierce. A clip from the campaign trail in 2007 made the rounds last week, in which Biden — then making his second bid for the presidency — told a voter that the country could have a “universal” Medicare plan that covers everyone from birth. “We can afford to do that,” Biden said at the time.
“What happened?” Sanders policy advisor Alex Jacquez asked in a tweet.
While Biden is the odds-on favorite to win the primary, Sanders has succeeded in popularizing Medicare for All among Democrats. In every state which has voted so far, exit polls have found majority support for the proposal with primary voters.
Cover: Democratic presidential candidate former Vice President Joe Biden watches protesters during a campaign rally at Renaissance High School in Detroit, Monday, March 9, 2020. (AP Photo/Paul Sancya)
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