Republican Sam Brown, working in opposition to U.S. Sen. Jacky Rosen, D-Nev., in a aggressive Senate race, is once more going through assaults that declare he needs to chop federal applications.
This time, Make the Street Nevada, a liberal political motion committee, is thumping Brown, a retired U.S. Military captain, for wanting to chop Medicaid and Social Safety.
“Jacky Rosen is combating for Nevada — decreasing healthcare prices and increasing inexpensive housing,” the group stated in an Oct. 28 X put up. “In the meantime, Sam Brown needs to chop Medicaid and Social Safety. Nevada wants a frontrunner who protects our future!”
We’ve checked an analogous declare Rosen lobbed in opposition to Brown, saying he supported “large cuts” to Social Safety and Medicare. We rated that declare Largely False.
However what about cuts to Medicaid?
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Though the Rosen marketing campaign’s claims about Social Safety and Medicare skewed Brown’s positions, there’s a bit extra fact to the Make the Street Nevada’s Medicaid assertion, largely as a result of Brown has supported a balanced price range modification.
Make the Street Nevada spokesperson Jose Rivera stated in an e-mail to PolitiFact his staff was centered on get-out-the-vote efforts and he didn’t suppose he might make PolitiFact’s Nov. 1 deadline to offer extra info.
Brown’s marketing campaign didn’t reply to an e-mail looking for remark. He stated in an announcement to the Nevada Present, a nonprofit information web site, for a Could 17 article, “I cannot lower Social Safety, Medicare, or Medicaid.”
The declare in opposition to Brown is well-documented, together with an opposition analysis file on Brown’s positions posted by the Democratic Senatorial Marketing campaign Committee, Senate Democrats’ major political motion committee. The publicly posted file consists of an identical excerpts to info Rosen’s marketing campaign offered for the Medicare and Social Safety fact-check.
The analysis file factors to Brown’s help for a balanced price range modification, which economists say would result in steep cuts to Social Safety, Medicare and Medicaid. The file additionally factors to prior feedback he made about desirous to remove federal companies which have a replica state company.
In February, Brown backed a 2018 plan from Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., that referred to as for a 1% lower to federal spending throughout the board to stability the price range, in line with a July 2024 article from the Nevada Present. Though Paul described the combo of cuts and spending freezes as minimal — round $13 billion — the Washington Put up Reality Checker discovered that description deceptive, noting Paul’s proposed cuts totaled trillions of {dollars} when accounting for elevated participation in Social Safety and Medicare as child boomers retire, elevated inhabitants and inflation.
Brown advised the Present he supported a balanced price range modification and thought Paul’s proposal was “a really cheap place to start out.”
Then-Home Speaker Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., promised a vote on a invoice in 2023 balancing the price range inside 10 years. McCarthy stated he didn’t need cuts to protection, Social Safety and Medicare.
An evaluation from the Committee for a Accountable Federal Funds, a nonpartisan budget-focused suppose tank, discovered balancing the price range by 2032 would require slicing 25% of federal spending. Excluding Social Safety and Medicare for cuts would necessitate slicing 85% of the remaining price range. To attain that, the federal authorities would wish to chop Medicaid in half and finish all different obligatory spending or remove Medicaid completely.
Transferring Medicaid administration to states
Brown additionally proposed a plan throughout a Could 9, 2022, Republican Senate main debate to remove federal companies that had an analogous state company. The Nevada Division of Well being and Human Providers oversees Medicaid within the state, making it an analogous company to the U.S. Division of Well being and Human Providers.
“So, I’ve a twofold plan right here,” Brown stated. “One is begin decreasing the allocation of cash to these federal departments and companies and that can begin slicing down our federal price range. And it additionally returns extra management and energy again to the states the place we have already got, for instance a Division of Transportation, a Division of Schooling, a Division of Power, environmental departments or companies. On the finish of the day, we cut back federal spending, however we additionally return energy again to the states.”
The moderator requested Brown particularly about Medicaid, and Brown answered, “A whole lot of that’s obligatory spending proper now. We will begin with what I simply described.”
Brown didn’t reply when the Nevada Present pressed him for specifics on how a state-run Medicaid program would work, saying he wouldn’t lower Medicaid.
Medicaid paid Nevada greater than $8 billion over fiscal years 2022 and 2023 for companies.
Brown complimented, however didn’t endorse, Scott’s sunsetting proposal
The opposition analysis file cites Brown’s feedback on a 2022 proposal by Sen. Rick Scott, R-Fla., that included mechanically sunsetting federal laws after 5 years, together with Social Safety and Medicaid, as another agenda to that of Senate Minority Chief Mitch McConnell, R-Ky.
Democrats have generally exaggerated Republican help for Scott’s manifesto, although taken actually, the plan would sundown Medicaid until it was particularly renewed. Scott ultimately revised the plan in February 2023 to incorporate a observe saying his name to sundown federal laws was by no means supposed to use to Social Safety or Medicare, although didn’t particularly point out Medicaid.
Brown, chatting with the Spring Mountain Republican Ladies in Las Vegas two days after Scott launched his plan, was captured on a recording saying he admired Scott for producing the plan.
“I believe I respect that he’s making an attempt to look ahead, he’s making an attempt to solid a constructive imaginative and prescient,” Brown stated. “One of many issues, I believe, that a few of the Republican Celebration leaders have failed at is we’ve got grow to be labeled — and generally we do that to ourselves — is we grow to be the celebration of ‘No. Oh, no, we’re not going to try this.’ We are the celebration of simply rejecting coverage as an alternative of the celebration of projecting concepts. What Rick Scott has carried out, trying to create a roadmap for a greater America, is one thing that I love as nicely.”
Brown by no means talked about specifics or outright endorsed Scott’s plan within the recording.
Our ruling
Make the Street Nevada stated, “Sam Brown needs to chop Medicaid and Social Safety.”
Make the Street Nevada’s declare exaggerates Brown’s help for slicing Social Safety. A Democratic Senatorial Marketing campaign Committee opposition analysis file, which has been the inspiration for different assaults on Brown, based mostly a lot of this on Brown supporting Scott’s plan, which referred to as for sunsetting federal laws each 5 years. Brown by no means stated he supported Scott’s plan, solely that he admired Scott’s making an attempt to articulate a imaginative and prescient for the Republican Celebration.
Nevertheless, there’s extra fact to Make the Street Nevada’s declare about Medicaid. Brown supported across-the-board cuts to federal companies by a balanced price range modification. Balancing the federal price range is just not so simple as Brown makes it sound.
Brown has stated he is not going to lower Medicaid, however declined to specify a balanced price range modification that may protect Social Safety and Medicare with out slicing Medicaid. Federal price range analysts stated to make sure no cuts to Social Safety and Medicare — as Brown stated he needs — Medicaid would have to be lower both in half or completely.
We price the declare Half True.
