House Bill Could ‘Fast Track’ Medicare, Medicaid Cuts, Senator Warns

McKnight’s Home Care | By Adm Healy
 
A bill advancing through the House would create a process to expedite major fiscal policy changes, including cuts to the Medicare, Medicaid and the Social Security program, according to Sen. Ron Wyden (D-OR), Senate Finance Committee chair.
 
The Fiscal Commission Act would create a commission of experts tasked with identifying strategies for the United States to “improve the fiscal situation in the medium term and to achieve a sustainable debt-to-GDP ratio of the long term,” according to the bill’s text. The group, made up of both legislators and “outside experts,” would recommend ways that federal programs such as Medicare or Medicaid could improve their solvency over the next 75 years.
 
“The term ‘fiscal commission’ is the ultimate Washington buzzword, and it translates to trading away Americans’ earned benefits in a secretive, closed-door process,” Wyden said in a Jan. 18 statement.
 
Rep. Bill Huizenga (R-MI) and 13 others, a mix of Republicans and Democrats, introduced the bill last Sept. 28, and the number of cosponsors has since grown to 24. The House Budget Committee approved the bill on Thursday, moving it further towards official passage by the House. 
 
Wyden argued that the creation of such a fiscal commission would allow program cuts to be rushed through the legislative process. 
 
“The proposals … would fast-track cuts to Social Security and Medicare,” he warned in a statement, “and allow a handful of legislators and unelected political insiders to trade away Americans’ earned benefits in a secretive, closed-door process.”
 
He also requested that certain federal benefits, including Medicare and Medicaid, be barred from consideration by any fiscal commission. However, the House Budget Committee approved the legislation without such a provision.
 
“No one should be trying to claw back Americans’ earned Social Security and Medicare benefits,” he said. “I urge Speaker [Mike] Johnson to take Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid off the table as part of any proposed fiscal commission.”