Governor Gretchen Whitmer spoke out Wednesday against a congressional Republican budget proposal that would force big cuts to federal spending, possibly including popular entitlement programs such as Medicaid.
In contrast to the first Trump term, Whitmer has avoided showdowns with the Republican president early in his second term. But she said the stakes are high as the levels of proposed spending rollbacks by congressional Republicans would have to include reductions to Medicaid and Medicare. She said the effects of that would cut across all sectors of Michigan’s economy and everyone in the state would feel it.
“This isn’t unique to one area or one constituency,” she said. “Every one of us is going to pay.”
“There will be a loss of jobs,” Whitmer said, flanked by health care workers at an event at an Ann Arbor hospital. “There will be a loss of access to health care, not just for people who get their insurance through Medicaid, but for every one of us, and that’s why this is so serious and that's why we wanted to raise up these important voices that are on the front lines every single day.”
President Trump has said Medicaid and Medicare would be spared under his budget priorities. But many budget experts — including the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office — say his target of $880 billion in savings is impossible to achieve without big reductions to popular entitlement programs.
“You know, society is judged by the way it manages the babies and the seniors,” said Dr. Kimberlydawn Wisdom, a a senior vice president at Henry Ford Health. “So, this is a time of reckoning in terms of this cut would have such devastating impact.”
