Sen. Thom Tillis (N.C.), one of the most vulnerable Senate Republican incumbents facing re-election in 2026, warned Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.) bluntly in a private meeting Tuesday that deep cuts to Medicaid could cost Republicans control of the House and Senate, according to a person familiar with the conversation.<\/p>\n
Tillis, who has kept relatively quiet about the hundreds of billions of dollars in Medicaid cuts proposed by the Senate Finance Committee, blasted his leadership\u2019s plan to forge ahead during a Republican luncheon on Capitol Hill.<\/p>\n
\u201cThom Tillis got up and he had a chart on what the Senate\u2019s provider tax structure will cost different states, including his. His will lose almost $40 billion. He walked through that and said \u2018this will be devastating to my state,\u2019\u201d said a person familiar with Tillis\u2019s blunt exchange with Thune behind closed doors.<\/p>\n
The proposal to cap the health care provider tax rate is a major cost cutter in President Trump\u2019s \u201cbig, beautiful bill,\u201d but it is also among the most controversial provisions. Several key GOP senators have expressed alarm about the Medicaid cuts in the Senate\u2019s version of the legislation.<\/p>\n
Tillis\u2019s chart, which he also showed to colleagues, showed that North Carolina would lose $38.9 billion in federal funding and that more than 600,000 North Carolinians would be at risk for losing Medicaid coverage.<\/p>\n
\u201cTillis said this is going to be like ObamaCare. He said just like ObamaCare led to huge losses for Democrats in 2010 and 2012, he said this could be the same thing for us because hundreds of thousands of people in his state, millions around the nation are going to be kicked off of Medicaid \u2014 working people, who are Trump voters,\u201d the source told The Hill.<\/p>\n
Tillis warned \u201cit could cost us majorities in both houses\u201d of Congress, the source added.<\/p>\n
The North Carolina Republican called on the GOP leadership to abandon the Senate Finance Committee\u2019s language on capping health care provider taxes, which would dramatically restrict states\u2019 ability to draw more federal funding, and return to the Medicaid language passed last month by the House.<\/p>\n
\u201cThune didn\u2019t like that very much,\u201d the source added of the GOP leader\u2019s reaction.<\/p>\n
Tillis told The Hill that he has a tendency to be \u201cblunt,\u201d especially when he thinks something might be going in the wrong direction.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m generally very blunt so I don\u2019t think it was any more than normal,\u201d he said of his candid comments to GOP leaders at the meeting.<\/p>\n
He\u2019s worried that Republican colleagues have become so fixated on cutting Medicaid as a way to pay for Trump\u2019s agenda that they may be losing sight of the bigger political picture.<\/p>\n
Tillis said he sees some similarities to the political pitfalls that Democrats suffered in 2010 after zealously pushing the Affordable Care Act into law under former President Obama despite growing political opposition from around the country.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe Democrats became so obsessed with passing ObamaCare, they kept on moving. They made the promise, \u2018If you like your health care, you can keep it. If you like your doctor, you can keep it.\u2019 Exactly the opposite proved to be true,\u201d Tillis said.<\/p>\n
Tillis recalled that he defeated former Sen. Kay Hagan (D-N.C.) in the 2014 election by highlighting during the campaign that she and other Democrats made promises about ObamaCare that didn\u2019t hold up.<\/p>\n
He\u2019s worried that Republicans could wade into trouble by pledging that Trump\u2019s megabill won\u2019t cut Medicaid benefits if hundreds of thousands of people wind up losing coverage.<\/p>\n
\u201cNow we\u2019re saying we\u2019re going after waste, fraud and abuse but we\u2019re not going to affect beneficiaries. And there\u2019s going to be 600,000 in North Carolina and some 3 million [people] nationwide\u201d who are going to lose Medicaid coverage, he said.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt almost reads identically to what was being said in 2009 and 2010,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Tillis said he supports cutting federal spending but cautioned \u201cI want to cut in a way that states can absorb.\u201d<\/p>\n
Thune appeared to take the criticism in stride when he held a press conference immediately after the Republican lunch meeting.<\/p>\n
\u201cEverybody having fun yet?\u201d Thune quipped to the assembled reporters. \u201cJoin our lunches, it\u2019s very stimulating.\u201d<\/p>\n
Thune insisted the massive bill is still on track to pass the Senate by the end of the week.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe are making good headway on the reconciliation bill. As you all know, this is the legislation we believe implements the president\u2019s agenda. It makes our country safer, stronger and more prosperous,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe feel very good about the path that we\u2019re on and getting this across the finish line by the end of the week,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Republican senators have become increasingly concerned about the political fallout of cutting hundreds of billions of dollars from Medicaid, even though their leaders have pledged that people won\u2019t see their benefits cut.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe had a meeting last night, I\u2019d say there were a handful of senators who raised the issue of politics, the political consequences of Medicaid, and tried to make certain that people who are marching forward know there\u2019s a hazard,\u201d a GOP senator who requested anonymity said.<\/p>\n
\u201cChanges in Medicaid lend themselves toward the political ads that we see in today\u2019s politics,\u201d the senator warned.<\/p>\n
The senator said the Senate\u2019s language on capping states\u2019 use of health care provider taxes would lead to significantly deeper cuts to federal Medicaid funding than the House language.<\/p>\n
Senate Republicans are talking about setting up a $100 billion health care provider relief fund for rural hospitals, nursing homes and community health centers, but that may not solve their political problems.<\/p>\n
\u201cEven if that were to be incorporated, which I very much hope it will be, the Senate cuts are so much deeper than the House that the Medicaid provisions remain a problem for me,\u201d said Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine), who faces a competitive re-election race next year in a state that former Vice President Kamala Harris carried in 2024. \u00a0<\/p>\n
Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer (N.Y.) is vowing that Republicans will pay a political price in 2026 if their Medicaid cuts become law.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe public is overwhelmingly against these Medicaid cuts and anyone who votes for them is going to have real trouble in their states,\u201d he declared.<\/p>\n
He said the Medicaid cuts would have severe impacts \u201cin as many Republican states as Democratic states.\u201d<\/p>\n
He said Democrats have compiled a list of rural hospitals that would close because of federal funding cuts and pointed out that Kentucky \u2014 which is represented by Sens. Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) and Rand Paul (R-Ky.) \u2014 could lose more hospitals than any other state.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe have a list of rural hospitals that would close. Do you know which one has the highest? Thirty-five in Kentucky,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s political disaster for them,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Sen. Thom Tillis (N.C.), one of the most vulnerable Senate Republican incumbents facing re-election in 2026, warned Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.) bluntly in a private meeting Tuesday that deep cuts to Medicaid could cost Republicans control of the House and Senate, according to a person familiar with the conversation. Tillis, who has kept relatively quiet about the hundreds of billions of dollars in Medicaid cuts proposed by the…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1157,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[13],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/gogetterlifestylebrand.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1155"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/gogetterlifestylebrand.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/gogetterlifestylebrand.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gogetterlifestylebrand.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gogetterlifestylebrand.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1155"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/gogetterlifestylebrand.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1155\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1156,"href":"https:\/\/gogetterlifestylebrand.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1155\/revisions\/1156"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gogetterlifestylebrand.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1157"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/gogetterlifestylebrand.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1155"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gogetterlifestylebrand.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1155"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gogetterlifestylebrand.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1155"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}