Wasserman-Schultz stands by claim that GOP budget is a "death trap" for seniors

By: Lucy Madison
Topics: Congress

Debbie Wasserman-Schultz (D-Fla.) on CNN, April 14, 2011.

(Credit: CNN)

Incoming Democratic National Committee chairwoman Debbie Wasserman-Schultz on Thursday stood by her claim that the GOP's 2012 budget proposal represents a "death trap" for seniors.

Wasserman-Schultz, a Florida Democrat, told CNN's Kiran Chetry that she believed the 2012 GOP budget could have dire consequences for elderly Americans.

"It stands to reason that when 60 percent of seniors are in nursing homes or on Medicaid, and you dramatically cut the amount of funding that we are providing to states for Medicaid, then you are going to have some seniors not survive," she said.

Wasserman-Schultz first asserted that the GOP budget would "literally be a death trap for seniors" on MSNBC on April 6. On Thursday, when asked specifically if she thought the plan put seniors' lives at risk, she said, "That's exactly what I'm suggesting."

Seniors, she argued, "won't be able to either get access to a nursing home, or they'll get kicked out of a nursing home, and they'll have to make it on their own."

"That is not what America is about," she added.

The GOP budget plan would transform Medicaid into a block grant program in which states get a lump sum from the federal government. It mandates $771 billion less in federal spending on the program over a decade. The GOP budget also turns Medicare into a voucher program, potentially leaving some seniors to pay more of their health care costs.

Wasserman-Schultz also targeted Republicans for their negotiating techniques.

"There's the difference between Democrats' approach to our major fiscal problems and Republicans': Republicans start out saying, 'There's something off the table.' President Obama starts off saying, 'Everything's on the table and we need to come together,'" she said.

But she added that she believes the two parties will be able to compromise on a plan for reducing the deficit.

"I'm confident and I think our leadership is confident that we can do this again - but everything has to be on the table," she said. "We can't balance our fiscal health on the backs of those who can least afford it exclusively."

Wasserman-Schultz was appointed to the DNC chair on April 5, after Tim Kaine, the current chair, announced that he would be leaving the position to run for Senate in Virginia.

Lucy Madison
Lucy Madison is a political reporter for CBSNews.com.
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by justme2012 May 29, 2011 10:16 PM EDT: Didn't Obama cut 1/2 trillion from Medicare???

So she says that Obama is killing seniors??

That i can believe.; Reply to this comment

by Levygp April 15, 2011 2:47 PM EDT

Dear Ms. Incoming Nastynal Democrat: Keep out of the Florida Sun, or wear a hat. You are obviously suffering from Sun Stroke. Death Trap? Well, the alligators around your home in Florida may be more of a death trap, so watch out for them. Never mind the GOP "threat..." watch out for them alligators. Congrats -- you have signed on to a train that is heading for a wreck. Are you all the Demorats could come up with?

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by theaffluentsociety2 April 17, 2011 2:29 AM EDT: why not disagree with her with statistics and information, instead of thinly veiled personal attacks? If you can prove that privatized healthcare and medicare are superior to government welfare, then prove it. Dont just appeal to hate and namecalling


by Steady321 April 15, 2011 11:04 AM EDT: This woman is almost as annoying as Stretch Pelosi. For God's sake, is this the Democrats can do???????; Reply to this comment

by simpleconservative April 15, 2011 1:40 AM EDT

Earth to wasserman, if the entire program goes bankrupt, everyone will be at risk. It always amazes me how stupid well educated idiots sound!

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by pdchapin April 15, 2011 9:03 AM EDT: I don't know. Are you educated?

There are a lot of ways of saving Medicare/Medicaid without simply cutting back. You can always increase revenues (taxes) although by itself that's probably not a great idea. As for the Republican plan, I'd have to see the details. Personally I'm a believer in liberal federalism which says pick a goal and let the states figure out how to meet it. If one state wants a single payer system and another wants vouchers and private insurance, so be it. Block grants would be perfectly reasonable assuming they're large enough and the requirements on the states are reasonable.


by jimbom121 April 15, 2011 9:46 AM EDT: Privatizing it will not save the program...it will kill it.


by wfw3536 April 14, 2011 11:30 PM EDT: No matter what party you belong to, it is so sad that politicans try to scare seniors this way.; Reply to this comment

by gep1955 April 14, 2011 11:17 PM EDT

The dems always scream the end of the world when anyone suggests contol and power over departments should go somewhere else. Don't freeze the debt ceiling, LOWER IT! Ask your democratic representative why we need 4,5, and 6 programs that all do the same thing and waste out taxes.

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by jimbom121 April 15, 2011 9:43 AM EDT: ummmm, who was screaming about death panels last year?

by RobAla April 14, 2011 9:35 PM EDT

Wasserman is talking the same old tired Democrat crap. She says the Republicans are out to kill Grandma, while she neglects to mention how the Democrats cuts more than $400 billion from Medicare when they passed the idiotic health care law last year.

She is absolutely talking nonsense, but there will be a host of people who will just eat it all up. The CBO and President Obama's Deficit Commission have stated that what we are doing is UNSUSTAINABLE. What have to change things, and it can't just be taxing the so called rich.

How does President Obama not understand that increasing taxes on businesses and people making more than $200,000 will, result in higher unemployment? If a business has to use the money it has for hiring an additional worker to send to the federal government in higher taxes - it equals JOB LOST. If people making more than $200,000 have to use money for purchasing a service or good from a business to send to the federal government in higher taxes - it means that businesses have less activity and it equals JOB LOST. The President has to understand this, but he must be thinking that he can confiscate more money from less people.

We have two concepts of deficit reduction here:
1) Paul Ryan's Plan: Cut government a lot, requiring far less revenue to run the government. Lower taxes on business, but get rid of the tax loopholes. This enables businesses to be more able to afford additional workers, and additional workers paying taxes will send more revenue to the government. It also diminishes the power of lobbyist to control government, and gives more power back to the people.

2) President Obama's Plan: Cut the federal government only a little, causing a greater need for revenue to run the government. Try to make up the ground by increasing taxes on businesses and those making more than $200,000. It will result in higher unemployment, and that means less people paying taxes. He just hopes to collect more from less people. Without getting rid of tax loopholes, it leaves the lobbyists in power in Washington.

My vote is for option 1.

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by realist51 April 15, 2011 10:22 AM EDT: Really! and what jobs have the tax cuts created in the last ten years? unemployment is still 8.8 % if your analogy is correct then there should be full employment and then some. The tax cut creates job republican socialistic program is a huge failure. yet when levels were at a higher rate under clinto there were jobs every where and just before he left office the U.R. was 3.9%. Under kennedy who had a rate of 75% to work with and lowered it 10% still left him with enough revenues that we fought two wars, went to the moon in less than 9 years and fully funded Social security, created medicare under johnson (fully funded). Increase the tax rates for now. we did lower them in the past and once the debt is taken care can lower them again. in turn too a freeze on S.S and medicare wouldn't hurt and a severe cut in defense and ending the two republican unfunded wars in the middle east would be a good start. eliminating corporate welfare programs and making them work in a truly free market system (on there own)with no subsides. there are a lot of alternative other than Ryan's gut grandma and grandpa bill

by RobAla April 14, 2011 8:28 PM EDT

Death trap??? What a crock. Ryan's budget is attempt to save Medicare, President Obama's budget is a continuing fiscal sinkhole.

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by jimbom121 April 15, 2011 9:43 AM EDT: No, he is killing medicare.

by doctor_know April 14, 2011 7:49 PM EDT

Privatization of Medicare is stupid. Private health insurance companies are stupid.... We are paying for them to make a profit off our healthcare. We should have the option of having private insurance, but we should also have the option of government run insurance like everyone else in the civilized world gets.

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by MissMeYetAbdullah April 14, 2011 7:52 PM EDT: Someday the United States will be as rich and powerful as France, Germany, Austria, Norway, all those countries whose economies are in better shape than ours, yet can afford to provide health care for all their citizens, and live longer than we do.

Someday.

Until then, we should resign ourselves to our second-class status in the world. Not everybody can live in a nation as wealthy and powerful as Denmark.


by doctor_know April 14, 2011 8:00 PM EDT: Well, Denmark pays for 4 year college for all of it's citizens, even private schools overseas. I'd say countries with that mentality will be doing better than us in the future!


by credibility2 April 14, 2011 5:25 PM EDT: ...sort of like the provisions the Dems and the president rammed down everyone's throats with the so-called health care reform...chicken littles...the sky is falling...the sky is falling...watch their noses grow...; Reply to this comment