How Democrats use health care alarmism to cling to power

When the sky’s red at night, we’re in for mild weather. When Punxsutawney Phil sees his shadow, we’re in for six more weeks of winter. And when Democrats start losing, we’re in for a lot of fearmongering about health care.

Rep. Al Green’s (D-Texas) outburst during President Trump’s address to Congress last week was the latest example of Democratic health care alarmism. The Texas congressman waved his cane and shouted that Trump had “no mandate” to cut Medicaid before the sergeant-at-arms escorted him from the floor. The House later censured him for the disruption. Though Green is known for his dramatic antics, this was part of a well-established tradition.

Republicans’ budget resolution is a good step in that direction, but they’ll need to work on their messaging to hold onto their House majority long enough to make a real difference.

In 2017, Republicans controlled the House, Senate, and presidency, positioning them to fulfill their 2010 promise to repeal and replace Obamacare. The proposed American Health Care Act aimed to modify key aspects of the law while preserving others, but it ultimately failed in the Senate.

The Affordable Care Act, signed by President Obama, barred insurers from denying coverage to people with pre-existing conditions or charging them higher premiums. While intended to protect vulnerable patients, the policy led to higher premiums for everyone, including those already struggling to afford health care.

Republicans proposed a different solution: letting the states place people with pre-existing conditions into “high-risk pools,” allowing insurers to charge them high premiums, and providing government subsidies to offset those costs. The chronically ill could access the care they needed without driving up costs for everyone.

More doom, more gloom

This all sounds fairly tame and technocratic, but if you watched Democrats’ campaign ads leading up to the 2018 midterms, you’d get the impression that Donald Trump and then-House Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Ohio) had personally executed every cancer-ridden grandma in the country. About half of the party’s ads that cycle focused on health care, especially the issue of pre-existing conditions.

And it worked. Democrats picked up 41 seats, ending Trump’s trifecta.

In 2022, Democrats were polling badly in the lead-up to that year’s midterms. Joe Biden was unpopular, the Afghanistan withdrawal had become a national embarrassment, and inflation was out of control. Right on cue, health care hysteria commenced.

Sen. Rick Scott (R-Fla.) laid out an 11-point plan for that election cycle, which included a proposal that — in his words — “all federal legislation should sunset in five years” unless Congress repassed it. While this proposal probably wouldn’t have had much effect other than creating more work for Congress, Democrats saw their chance and pounced.

Then-Sen. Debbie Stabenow (D-Mich.) claimed Scott’s proposal would “end Medicare and Social Security and Medicaid.” The Democratic National Committee flooded the airwaves with the same alarmism.

That November, Democrats managed to hold down their losses in the House and even expanded their Senate majority. While it would be an overstatement to attribute their strong performance to health care alarmism alone, it certainly didn’t hurt.

History repeating?

Today, the Democrats find themselves in a similarly precarious situation. Republicans, once again, have a trifecta, and Trump is basking in the best approval ratings of his political career. Democrats have so far failed to marshal an effective resistance or even settle on a cohesive message — so they’re breaking out the old playbook.

Green’s theatrics about proposed Medicaid cuts attracted plenty of attention, but his fellow Democrats are starting to parrot the same talking points. Sen. Maggie Hassan (D-N.H.) recently warned that House Republicans’ plan “could take health care away from up to 25 million Americans.”

In reality, this is just more fearmongering. Advocates of socialized medicine like Wendell Potter, who quit his job as a Cigna executive to shill for single-payer health care, insist that expanding Medicaid is simply “the right thing to do.” Even though ironically, he also explained elsewhere how insurers turn Medicaid into their own personal piggy bank.

Sticking millions of more people on Medicaid — including illegal immigrants, if some Democrats have their way — hurts the very people it’s designed to help. Since Obama raised the eligibility threshold to 138% of the poverty line, the result has been overcrowding, provider shortages, and massive cost overruns.

It would be very convenient if lawmakers could fix American health care by throwing more money at it, but that’s simply not the case. Comprehensive reforms are needed to tackle systemic issues of waste, fraud, and inefficiency.

Republicans’ budget resolution is a good step in that direction, but they’ll need to work on their messaging to hold onto their House majority long enough to make a real difference. Otherwise, House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.) will ride a blue wave of health care alarmism straight to the speaker’s chair in 2026.