�Թϲ�����

The massive redistribution of wealth from poor to rich that’s masquerading as a health-care bill in the U.S. Senate is even more cruel in some ways than the bill that cleared the House and that President Donald Trump later called “mean.” Under the bill that Majority Leader Mitch McConnell wants to whisk into law, 22 million Americans would lose their health insurance by 2026 while out-of- pocket costs would rise for the insured, according to an analysis by the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office. Recall that Trump promised no one would lose insurance and that coverage would be better if he became president. (6/28)

Donald Trump asked Senate Republicans to introduce a healthcare bill with “more heart.” They didn’t. The senators’ draft legislation, introduced last Thursday, will strip tens of millions of low-income and middle-class Americans of their health insurance. Millions more will face higher costs for lower coverage. The Congressional Budget office estimates 22 million more people will likely be uninsured by 2026 than would be if the Affordable Care Act remained law. (Judy Lubin, 6/28)

For example, Vice President Mike Pence touted this as a new system based on “personal responsibility.” He did not specify what failure of “personal responsibility” he finds in people with disabilities who won’t be able to get treatment under the Republican plan. Kellyanne Conway opined that those who lose their Medicaid “can always get jobs.” Which will doubtless surprise many low-income workers who depend on it. They thought they already had jobs, albeit jobs that don’t offer health insurance. A woman on Twitter asked what will happen to her son “born at 26 weeks with a serious heart condition.” Another woman replied: “Sorry about your son, but what would he have done 200 years ago things are much better but nothing is promised to anyone.” (Leonard Pitts Jr., 6/27)

News outlets around the country led with a big number from the Congressional Budget Office’s review of the Senate health care bill: Were it to pass, 22 million people could “lose” insurance, as many put it. (6/27)

It stands to reason that in an era of alternative facts and alt-right websites generating fake news, we're not getting the whole story on the U.S. Senate Republicans' bill to overhaul the Obama-era health care law. On Monday, Tom Ashbrook, the normally measured host of National Public Radio’s “On Point,” about lost it after failing to get his guests to simply agree what the bill would do. "It just stinks when Americans can’t hear what is actually in this bill!” Ashbrook exclaimed. (Rekha Basu, 6/27)

Yet another influential group heard from on the Senate’s plan to cut health-insurance for the poor in order to offer tax cuts to the wealthy. This time, it’s the nation’s Catholic bishops, responding to the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office report that 22 million Americans would no longer have insurance by 2026 -- either because they don't want it or their employer no longer offers it or they can't afford it. (Laurie Roberts, 6/27)

For millions of Americans across the country, the possible repeal of the Affordable Care Act is a terrifying prospect. People are facing dire consequences if President Donald Trump succeeds in his quest to destroy health care to serve a political talking point, and the impact on LGBTQ people, communities of color, women, children, seniors and others disproportionately reliant on the ACA will be devastating. (Chad Griffin and William Hardy, 6/28)

If you were Thom Tillis, but without his paycheck, would you think the Senate Republican health plan is a good idea? Let’s say you were 60 years old, just four years older than Tillis, and from Mecklenburg County, as he is. If you made $40,000 and purchased a Bronze plan on the Affordable Care Act exchange, you’d pay about $1,100 in premiums after tax credits. Under the Republican health plan – the Better Care Reconciliation Act – you would pay $5,420, according to a Kaiser Family Foundation analysis. That’s an increase of 393 percent. (6/27)