While President Donald Trump has agreed to target fiscal waste, he remains wary of his party's plans to pursue any additional cuts to Medicaid, a program he has consistently vowed to protect. In a collaboration between Politico and Business Insider, we explore how this clash is playing out on Capitol Hill.
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00:00Speaker Johnson's biggest problem in paying for Trump's agenda? Trump himself.
00:04Republicans under Johnson want to slash Obamacare's Medicaid expansion to pay
00:08for Trump's tax bill. But while Trump is all about targeting waste, fraud, and
00:12abuse, six White House sources tell me he's still uncomfortable with anything
00:16that could be construed as a cut. He did, after all, promise over.
00:19I'm not gonna cut Social Security like every other Republican and I'm not gonna
00:23cut Medicare or Medicaid. And over.
00:25And we will not cut Social Security, Medicare or Medicaid benefits.
00:30And over again.
00:31We're not gonna touch it.
00:32To protect Medicaid. Three power players to watch on this looming conflict.
00:36One, a potential Trump whisperer.
00:38Republicans are hoping Speaker Johnson can use his good relationship with Trump
00:42to convince him to accept some of these Medicaid cuts. We'll see.
00:45Number two, the voters.
00:46Roughly 20 million people received coverage from Obamacare's Medicaid expansion.
00:50Two of my House Republican sources say as many as 10 million people could lose
00:54coverage in some of these proposals that Republicans are considering.
00:57That's tough politics to justify, even if you're framing it as waste, fraud, and abuse.
01:01Number three, Big Pharma.
01:03Trump wants Republicans to slash Medicaid drug prices.
01:05This idea is very popular with voters, with something like 80% of the public supporting it.
01:10But Republicans in Big Pharma have blocked Trump on it before.
01:13A lot to watch in the coming days.