Raphael Warnock Slams GOP Over Work Requirements For Medicaid: ‘They Are Coming After People’s Healthcare’

During Tuesday's Senate Democrats' press briefing, Sen. Raphael Warnock (D-GA) spoke about the consequences of work requirements for Medicaid.

Transcript

00:00So the Republicans have a real problem. They are trying to cut $880 billion

00:09out of Medicaid and there is not enough waste, fraud, and abuse to cut $880

00:16billion from Medicaid, not even close. And so they are coming after people's

00:24healthcare. Pure and simple. And they'll find many ways to talk about this. They'll

00:30talk about work requirements. But let's be clear what they're talking about.

00:35They're really talking about work reporting requirements. We have already

00:41seen this experiment in Georgia. Our governor has a program called Pathways

00:47to Coverage. He ought to call it Roadblocks to Coverage. We've got over 500,000

00:53people in Georgia who are in the healthcare coverage gap. A lot of those

00:58folks could be covered right now if Georgia would just accept the Medicaid

01:03expansion. Instead, we've seen this program and 20 months later, they've

01:09covered a whopping 7,000 people. That's it. 7,000 people. And so all of these

01:17are just tricks. These efforts are putting red tape up, asking people to

01:22certify their hours month after month after month. Does not incentivize work, but

01:29it does a very good job of keeping working people off of their healthcare. And as a

01:35result of that, our workforce grows sicker and poorer, and it's a drag on our

01:42economy. Every time I hear this, I think about Heather Payne, who is a traveling nurse in

01:50Georgia. And ironically, she spent her whole career working in healthcare. And one

01:55day she got sick. And to make a long story short, she discovered she had had a

02:00series of mini strokes. And she needed to see a neurologist, but she didn't have

02:05healthcare. And so all of this time later, she's struggling trying to get her life

02:10back together. Heather Payne, traveling nurse from Georgia, doesn't need work

02:16requirements. She needs healthcare so that she can get back to work. The data is very

02:24clear on this. I released a report on this last week. I want to see people work. My

02:32daddy drilled that into me. And so we're not going to let people moralize and preach to us

02:37about work requirements, while they're giving billionaires a tax cut. The way to

02:43get people back to work is to have a healthy workforce. And so we all must raise

02:49our voices on this budget. A budget is not just a fiscal document, it's a moral

02:55document. Show me your budget and I'll show you who you think matters and who does

03:01not. And if this budget that they're trying to push through using

03:06reconciliation, we're an EKG, it will suggest that the Republican Party has a heart problem

03:13and that they are in need of moral repair. And so we will continue to raise the voices

03:18of ordinary people and stand on the side of the people who sent us here so that they

03:23can get back to work and do the best by their families.

03:27Thank you, Senator Warnock.