OPINION: Shapiro Sticks Up For Health Care As Some In GOP Remind Us They’re Worse Than Trump

Amid the corruption, incompetence and downright evilness of the GOP White House and Congress, I’m grateful to have a Democratic statesman for a governor.

I don’t agree with everything Josh Shapiro advocates, like taxpayer-funded vouchers for private schools. But unlike Donald Trump, who’ll throw anyone under any vehicle if they aren’t enriching or empowering him, he’s made supporting and protecting Pennsylvanians a priority.

In the past week, Shapiro addressed the proposed cuts to Medicaid and the need to protect hospitals from predatory private equity companies.

A deeper dive into those serious health care issues shows that some in the GOP are even meaner and self-serving than Trump.

Slashing Medicaid by nearly $800 billion over 10 years is just one ugly part of Trump’s “big, beautiful (federal budget) bill” to make the rich richer and life more costly and unhealthy for the rest of us. (Also slated to go under the knife are the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program and efforts to fight climate change and pollution.)

Shapiro and the nation’s 22 other Democratic governors, whose states account for a majority of the U.S. population, warned that children, veterans, disabled and older people who rely on Medicaid coverage will suffer, as will many others because of the resulting hospital closures and “fiscal chaos.”  

Some GOP members of Congress aren’t on board, either. Sen. Josh Hawley of Missouri called the cuts “morally wrong and politically suicidal,” but many of his fellow MAGAs keep … billing … this budget provision as eliminating waste, fraud and abuse.

“It might be the BS that they share to comfort themselves at night, to not have to think about the people that they’re going to knock off of Medicaid and health care access,” Shapiro said in an interview on WILK-FM in Wilkes Barre. 

But the bill wasn’t cruel enough for four GOP House members. On Friday, they  stopped it, at least temporarily, from clearing the Budget Committee, despite Trump’s (digital) screams on his “Truth” Social platform) to “STOP TALKING, AND GET IT DONE!”

The quartet did raise a legitimate concern about the nation’s $36 trillion debt load, and Moody’s lent credence by downgrading U.S. credit one notch below its highest rating.

But besides increased government spending and rising interest rates, Moody’s cited the cuts to taxes, and therefore government revenue, that Trump has been clamoring for and that his allies in Congress embedded in his big, beautiful bill.

Good hospital bills

On Thursday, Shapiro visited Delaware County to throw his support behind proposed state legislation to stop profiteers from creating health care deserts.

Prospect Medical Holdings, which until 2021 was owned by private equity firm Leonard Green & Partners and is now bankrupt, has closed four of its Delco hospitals in the past three years, including two within the past month, after draining them of their resources. The county of about 575,000 residents now has only two hospitals.

Shapiro, who’s also providing assistance to displaced workers and $1 million to Delco to continue emergency management services, has urged the legislature to pass Senate Bill 322 and House Bill 1460.

The bills would prevent leaseback schemes that leave health care facilities burdened with inflated rental fees and allow the state attorney general to block or place conditions on their sales to for-profit buyers.

“Private equity has no place in our health care system,” Shapiro said. “We’ve seen what happens when corporate raiders like Prospect Medical Holdings prioritize profits over patients — families lose access to care, health care workers lose their jobs and communities across the Commonwealth suffer.”

There’s no question that health care providers face formidable challenges — including low Medicaid reimbursement rates. Cutting the program would only exacerbate “the health care crisis that is brewing,” Shapiro said.

So back to the big, beautiful bill. Notably absent is closing the carried interest loophole, even though Trump had been talking about ending this low tax rate on private equity, hedge fund and venture capital companies’ profits.

No one knows how serious Trump was, and he later vacillated. But rich and powerful Wall Streeters are determined to keep the loophole open, and their wishes carry a lot of weight in Washington.

Lisa Von Ahn is an experienced columnist previously published in the Pottsville Republican Herald newspaper.

Canary note: Opinions expressed in any Op-Ed column appearing on this site are the views of the writer and are not necessarily the opinions of Coal Region Canary.

Want to be a columnist with Coal Region Canary? Contact us at newscanary@gmail.com.

^{Photo: Coal Region Canary}

Subscribe to Coal Region Canary

Get email updates from Coal Region Canary by becoming a subscriber today. Just enter your email address below to get started!

Support Coal Region Canary

Like our reporting and want to support truly local news in Schuylkill County? Your small donations help. For as little as $5, your contribution will allow us to cover more news that directly affects you. Consider donating today by hitting the big yellow button below ...