Elizabeth Warren’s opinion on healthcare and the single payer option seems to shift with political convenience. It’s hard to believe, isn’t it?
Back in 2012, when being a good Democrat meant defending Obamacare at all costs, she abandoned her prior support for a single payer plan. She got caught in an interview with liberal Boston radio host Jim Braude.
Here’s a transcript of their conversation via the Weekly Standard:
Elizabeth Warren Supported Single-Payer Before She Opposed ItHOST: If you were the tsarina, something like single-payer, government run health care, far lower administrative costs, that sort of thing, would be the Senator Warren prescription, would it not?ELIZABETH WARREN: I think right now what we have to do–I’m serious about this–I think you’ve got to stay with what’s possible. And I think what we’re doing–and look at the dust-up around this–we really need to consolidate our gains around what we’ve got on the table.HOST: But you do support single-payer, do you not?WARREN: No, what I’ve got right now…HOST: You’ve wrote repeatedly that you have, have you not?WARREN: Oh! I think you need to go back and take a look.HOST: I have a paragraph: ‘The most obvious solution would be universal, single-payer health care. Single-payer care would also free families from dependents on an employers’ plan and make certain that everyone is covered whether or not – you wrote that with a co-author from Ohio.
Here’s the video:
Flash forward five years. Now that the healthcare debate is on again, Warren believes that everything should be “on the table” including a single payer option.
Mass Live reports:
Single payer health care should be at ‘top of the list’ if system gets overhauled, Sen. Elizabeth Warren saysA single-payer national health care system should be at the “top of the list” if there’s talk of re-jiggering the nation’s health care, Sen. Elizabeth Warren said Monday.Appearing in front of the pro-business group New England Council, Warren said President Donald Trump is “rooting” for the Affordable Care Act, also known as Obamacare, to fail, after support for a bill he backed with House Speaker Paul Ryan to repeal Obamacare fell apart amid an intraparty battle over legislative details.Afterwards, a reporter asked Warren if she supporters switching to a national system, sometimes called single payer or “Medicare for All.””It depends on where we want to go next. And what we can do next,” Warren said. “If the question is can we make the Affordable Care Act better or we can find some Republican colleagues to do that, absolutely, we should do what we can to improve it.”Obamacare is laden with Republican ideas, according to Warren, who noted the legislation is based on the health care reform bill passed in Massachusetts under Gov. Mitt Romney, a Republican.”How much Republican support did we get for that? Uh, none,” Warren said.”So if we’re talking about tearing down the health care system and starting over, then I think every option needs to be on the table, and single payer sure ought to be at the top of the list,” she added.
Here’s the video of that moment:
Just four days before this, Elizabeth Warren held a town hall event at Framingham State University and was asked about this by an attendee. You’ll notice that she uses the exact same language in her answer almost word for word which indicates that this is a new talking point.
Also noteworthy is the fact that this video is from the official ‘ElizabethForMA’ YouTube channel which means this is a message she wants people to hear:
Warren is very careful about parsing her words and positions on issues.
None of this is by accident.
Featured image via YouTube.
CLICK HERE FOR FULL VERSION OF THIS STORY