Florida Democratic Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz says the election of New York Democrat Kathy Hochul to a congressional seat that’s been in Republican hands for decades sends a “very strong national message” to the GOP about the House’s Medicare overhaul.
Wasserman Schultz also told CNN’s John King on Wednesday the message is that Americans “do not want to end Medicare as we know it,” and don’t want the safety net pulled out from underneath U.S. senior citizens.
“Oh, I think it sends a very strong national message to Republicans,” said Wasserman Shultz, who is also chairwoman of the Democratic National Committee. “And [Americans] understand that entitlement reform is necessary — and Democrats want Republicans to sit down at the table with us and really hammer out a compromise, a workable solution, so that we’re not balancing all the pain and the hurt on the backs of our seniors.”
Wasserman Schultz noted that the 26th district in New York is one of the worst for Democrats in the country.
“There’s only nine districts out of 435 that are worse than this one for Democrats, and a Democrat won the election, and it was Medicare,” she said. “Paul Ryan and the Republicans proposed — and voted for and continue to push — ending Medicare as we know it,” she said. “So, whether you’re 65 or 55, what they did was that they proposed an additional $6,400 in costs for seniors in healthcare and, in exchange in that budget, a $200,000 additional tax break for the wealthiest Americans.
“I mean, that's not a fact that they can run away from, as much as they might try.”
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