They’re ending the Medicare drug plan subsidy that keeps prescription costs down for seniors, and the Trump administration’s own guy told the Wall Street Journal the quiet part: seniors will probably pay more, but they can always go shop around. Go shop around. Like it’s a fucking coupon hunt and not your blood pressure medication.
Here’s the move. The subsidy encouraged insurers to cover more of the cost, so premiums stayed lower for old people on fixed incomes. The administration says that same subsidy is what let insurers jack up rates because the government was picking up the tab. So their solution is to kill the subsidy, which means the tab just gets handed to the seventy-four-year-old in the pharmacy line who already can’t afford her groceries.
And they know it. The article flat out says healthcare affordability is expected to be a focus in the midterm elections. That’s not an admission — that’s a goddamn confession. They know cutting this hurts seniors. They’re doing it anyway and planning the talking points for when seniors get mad about it.
The official’s line that seniors should just switch plans to find lower premiums is the kind of bullshit advice you’d get from someone who’s never had to choose between药 and rent. You don’t get to gut the safety net and then tell people the net was the problem.
This is what donor-owned dickweeds do. They cut the check that keeps people alive, call it efficiency, and then blame the insurance company when grandma can’t fill her prescription. Take the flag pin off before you hand her the bill.
Source story: Trump administration to end Medicare drug plan subsidy after 2026.