Stop the bosses’ assault on Medicaid!

As the MAGA regime made its tidal wave of reactionary presidential decrees and legislative offensives in the first 100-plus days of Trump taking office, it was obvious that a major goal of the billionaires’ government was to take more of the wealth the workers created and shift it to the rich, to the capitalists. 

Some of this was hidden behind the long-term destruction of the environment when he opened up public lands and seabeds for corporate plunder and allowed for  more polluting of Indigenous land. 

Some of this ripoff was obscured by the false presentation of tariffs as a tax on other countries. In reality, the tariffs are a regressive “sales tax” imposed on U.S. workers who budget based on purchases of goods produced in countries that produce at lower prices.

Some of this ripoff was masked as “government efficiency,” which dismantled government departments that at least partially service the needs of workers — like Veterans Affairs, Social Security, Medicare, Education, Labor, Occupational Safety and Health, etc.

If any cost was actually cut, it was immediately reversed by a bigger bloat in the military budget aimed at preparing a major war against China or Iran and continuing to arm Israel’s genocide. Now they also plan to cut taxes on corporations and the billionaires who Trump lined up behind him during the election.

To anyone who recognized the aim of the MAGA plutocracy (and rejected the ruling-class propaganda that falsely scapegoated migrant workers or those already discriminated against), Trump’s moves could be explained simply. He is taking more of the wealth created by the workers and handing it to the bosses. Robin Hood in reverse.

Now the Republicans in Congress have added to Trump’s bill with a direct attack on the health of millions of people who, in this richest of countries, have the lowest incomes and least access to care. It’s a bill that restricts the ability of these poorest members of the working class to get access to health care through Medicaid. 

According to the organizations that study these developments in detail — for example, the National Health Law Program — the House Republican proposal would slash over $7 billion from Medicaid over the next decade and cause 13.7 million people to lose health coverage. These rich House Republicans, who have only contempt for anyone below the poverty level, tried to disguise the cuts as “eligibility restrictions.” That’s BS.

This means making people work at least 80 hours a month to get Medicaid. And co-pay $35 to see a doctor. Nothing in the bill guarantees work will be offered, nor training, nor providing for extenuating circumstances that make such work impossible. And it includes enough obstacles when applying for Medicaid to discourage people from even trying. 

Trump himself must have realized that such unpopular steps might cut into his ever narrower base. He has even said repeatedly in public that he does not want to touch Medicaid in any way. 

Not that anyone can take something Trump says on any one day as worth the wind through his vocal chords. Even without this Medicaid cut, what he called his “one big, beautiful bill” was a ripoff of the workers and poor and a boon to the military-industrial complex. The latest news is that it is progressing through Congress.

The Democratic Party, while its Congressional members have voted against the “one big, beautiful bill,” has failed to mobilize what would obviously be a majority of the population against this assault. Both the “Hands Off” demonstrations and those by unions on May Day made it clear that masses of people would protest in defense of Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid. Most would also demonstrate against war.

It would be another crime, not only by Trump but by the two monopoly capitalist parties should they pass this attack on the working class. If it includes cuts to Medicaid, it means a direct attack on the most vulnerable part of the multinational and multigender working class, people able-bodied and with disabilities. A strong motto of the workers’ movement has always been “An injury to one is an injury to all.”

What is called for is a united struggle by all who understand that this assault is aimed at all that workers have won in the past. Once mobilized, this movement can go on to fight for more of what the bosses and billionaires steal from those who produce all the wealth of society. And fight against the wars their system drives them toward.