Liberal media spins Sen. Ernst’s town hall death reminder while Iowa Democrats make their play

Iowa Democrats and the liberal media appear desperate to undermine Sen. Joni Ernst (R) and paint her as uncompassionate as she prepares to fight for re-election next year.

Ernst fielded questions from a boisterous crowd during a town hall meeting in Parkersburg, Iowa, on Friday, including a question about changes to Medicaid in the reconciliation bill.

The senator explained that the proposed changes would correct over-payments and ensure that ineligible persons, including millions of illegal aliens, could not continue receiving payments. Ernst underscored that eligible and vulnerable Americans would continue to be protected.

Midway through her response, a woman in the audience — later revealed to be India May, a radical Democrat who plans to run for the Iowa House — shouted, “People will die.”

Ernst broke from her detailed answer to address the heckler’s claim — a claim that Office of Management and Budget Director Russell Vought later called “astroturf” and that other Democrats, including Rep. Hakeem Jeffries (N.Y.), have recycled — with a memento mori: “Well, we all are going to die so, for heaven’s sakes.”

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Photo by Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images

The media framed the senator’s remarks, which have gone viral on social media, as a callous response to “Medicaid cuts” in general, which President Donald Trump assured Americans Monday are not in the “one, big, beautiful bill.”

The Associated Press, for instance, captioned an excerpt of the senator’s answer, “Sen. Joni Ernst defends Medicaid cuts, says ‘well, we all are going to die.'” Vanity Fair ran a piece titled, “Joni Ernst Not Sure How Else to Explain She Doesn’t Give a F–k About Your Medicaid.” The New Republic published an article adopting the same framing, titled, “Joni Ernst Stoops to Shocking Low When Told Medicaid Cuts Will Kill.”

Iowa News Now ran footage of “Iowans” reacting poorly to the senator’s comment without noting that one of the featured commenters — identified in the reporting as a “father of two adults on Medicaid” — is actually the president of the local American Federation of Government Employees union and an activist who routinely criticizes Republicans.

CNN talking head Dana Bash repeatedly made reference to Ernst’s remark on her show Sunday, providing Sen. Chris Murphy (D-Conn.) with ample airtime to attack the Republican.

‘There’s only two certainties in life: death and taxes.’

“I think everybody in that audience knows that they’re going to die. They would just rather die in old age at 85 or 90, instead of dying at 40,” said Murphy. “I wish Joni and others saw the immorality of what they’re doing.”

As if coordinated with the media pile-on, Democratic Iowa state Rep. J.D. Scholten seized on Ernst’s bad press to announce that he was entering the U.S. Senate race to challenge her.

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Failed Democratic congressional candidate J.D. Scholten. Photo by Thomas McKinless/CQ Roll Call/Getty Images

Scholten, a pitcher for the Sioux City Explorers of the American Association of Baseball, told ABC News, one of the outfits that amplified the callous-comment narrative, that Ernst’s remarks “really hit home with me.”

“We need better leadership than that,” added Scholten.

As critics and opportunists began feigning offense, Ernst posted a sarcastic apology video, noting, “I would like to take this opportunity to sincerely apologize for a statement that I made yesterday at my town hall. See, I was in the process of answering a question that had been made by an audience member when a woman who was extremely distraught screamed out from the back corner of the auditorium, ‘People are going to die.'”

“I made an incorrect assumption that everyone in the auditorium understood that, yes, we are all going to perish from this earth,” continued Ernst. “So I apologize. And I’m really, really glad that I did not have to bring up the subject of the Tooth Fairy as well.”

Despite Democrats and liberal publications’ apparent effort to batter Ernst over the remarks, she remains action-oriented.

“While Democrats fearmonger against strengthening the integrity of Medicaid, Senator Ernst is focused on improving the lives of all Iowans,” a spokeswoman for Ernst told Blaze News. “There’s only two certainties in life: death and taxes, and she’s working to ease the burden of both by fighting to keep more of Iowans’ hard-earned tax dollars in their own pockets and ensuring their benefits are protected from waste, fraud, and abuse.”

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