Biden has a new strategy for winning the hearts and minds of senior voters

What Have We Learned in the Last Two Years? Creating a Better America from the Bottom Up to the Middle Out, and Improving the Economy

We have been making great progress over the past two years. The administration and the Democrats are working to build an economy that will grow from the bottom up and middle out.

The lowest unemployment rate in the last 50 years is 3.5%. We’ve created 10 million jobs, including almost 700,000 manufacturing jobs. My watch shows that “Made in America” is a reality.

We have more work to do. Inflation – driven by the pandemic and Russian President Vladimir Putin’s war in Ukraine – is a global challenge. I know a lot of people have a job and are still struggling to pay for groceries, gas and rent. That’s why I’m so determined to lower costs for families.

I’m working to reduce the burden on working- and middle-class people by bringing down the costs of everyday things they need for their families, such as health care premiums, prescription drugs and energy bills. The inflation reduction act got passed without a single vote of the republicans since it was about lower health care premiums for 13 million Americans and cheaper prescription drugs for seniors.

And partly because of the actions we’ve taken – including a historic release from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve – gas prices are decreasing. They’re down 12 cents since their peak this summer and they fell 10 cents this week. That’s adding up to real savings for families.

Republicans in Congress are speaking out against trickle-down economics that benefit the wealthy and big corporations. They’ve laid their plan out very clearly. It would increase your costs and make inflation worse.

Many Republicans in Congress are calling to roll back these provisions that lower prescription drug costs – some of which take effect in January. That means the $2,000 cap on prescription drugs for seniors would be gone. There is a$35-a-month cap oninsulin for senior citizens. Millions of Americans would not be able to save the average savings on health care premiums of hundreds of dollars a year. Republicans would increase those everyday costs.

Source: https://www.cnn.com/2022/10/25/opinions/american-people-face-a-choice-joe-biden/index.html

Why Do Republicans Want to Cut Social Security? A Demonstration of America’s Most Disturbed and Strongest Democratic Efforts

Democrats are making sure the biggest corporations begin to pay their fair share in taxes. In 2020, 55 of the wealthiest corporations in America paid no federal income tax. No longer. A 15% minimum tax was signed into law by me. And, I’m keeping my campaign commitment: no one earning less than $400,000 a year will pay a single penny more in federal taxes.

The narrative that Republicans want to cut Social Security stays because of it. Look at recent history — President George W. Bush tried to privatize Social Security, former House Speaker Paul Ryan’s budget proposed sweeping changes to Medicare, and even though former President Trump largely tabled serious talk of entitlement cuts, his budget did call for cuts to some aspects of Social Security and Medicaid.

This is not your father’s Republican party and many Republicans in congress want to ban abortion. If we lose the House, I will veto it right away, and codify it in January, if weelect more Senate Democrats.

Democracy is being put to the test in America. We are learning what every generation has to learn: nothing about democracy is guaranteed. It’s your job to defend it. Protect it. Choose it.

I’m absolutely confident that, just as they did in 2020, the American people will again vote in record numbers and make it clear that democracy is a value that both defines us and unites us as Americans.

We faced some of the most difficult challenges in our history and did not relent. And, I have never been more confident about our future. In 14 days, the American people will decide whether we keep moving forward or go backwards.

Former President Donald Trump and Democrats have already signaled plans to weaponize DeSantis’ comments against him, should he announce for president, and subsequent votes in Congress for non-binding budget resolutions that privatized Medicare and raised the retirement age to 70.

The 2012 presidential election made Democrats want to take aim at the Medicare privatization plans that Paul Ryan proposed as the Republican vice presidential candidate. That debate produced a political ad, paid for by the progressive Agenda Project Action Fund, that showed Ryan dumping a wheelchair bound granny off a cliff as the words “is America Beautiful” flashed on the screen.

It’s going to be bankrupt if you have a system with no market forces or consumer choice, and that’s why I would support proposals like the one Ryan offered, which would make it possible to have market forces and consumer choice.

At the time, DeSantis was a Tea Party fiscal conservative, running with the backing of conservative groups like Phyllis Schlafly’s Eagle Forum, FreedomWorks, the Club for Growth, and the Madison Project.

DeSantis has yet to announce he if he running for president in 2024, nor has he spoken publicly about his position on the entitlement programs as the governor or Florida, preferring to focus on culture war issues.

In his speech to the nation on Tuesday and in his speeches on Wednesday and Thursday, the president referred to a part of Scott’s plan that states that federal legislation will end in 5 years. Congress can pass laws again if they’re worth keeping. Social Security and Medicare are not currently required for congressional re-approval, so Biden was correct in saying that all federal legislation would include them.

“I think people who are low income will probably be given coverage that is similar to what they have now,” he said in the interview with the St. Augustine Record. I don’t think people like me will have to pay more because I’ve been more successful. Premium support will guarantee a certain amount of coverage for me.

He said that if you want a Cadillac plan or something, then it should be driven by the consumer rather than imposed on the taxpayers. That makes sense to me.

“What I think we need to do for people in my generation particularly, is start to restructure the program, in a way that’s gonna be financially sustainable, both Social Security and Medicare,” he added.

After getting elected, one of DeSantis’ first interviews as a newly sworn-in member was on CNN on January 4, 2013, where he said he hoped Congress would take on restructuring entitlements when asked about Social Security and Medicare.

The State of the Union exchange between Biden and GOP legislators that followed his accusation of Republicans threatening the two giant entitlement programs for the elderly was not just about politics; it was also about positioning for his reelection campaign.

Biden and the White House watched a video of Lee saying, “I’m here right now to tell you one thing that you probably have never heard from a politician.” I want to get rid of Social Security, so I’ll phase it out. Lee’s quote that Medicare and Medicaid need to be pulled up has gone viral, and there is another one where he says the same thing.

Scott responded by accusing Biden of being dishonest and confused. Scott argued on Twitter on Wednesday that while his plan does say that “all” federal legislation should sunset in five years and become subject to a new vote by Congress, “This is clearly & obviously an idea aimed at dealing with ALL the crazy new laws our Congress has been passing of late.”

Biden may have created an inaccurate impression, however, by mentioning the sunset proposal during the section of the State of the Union in which he discussed the battle over the debt ceiling. There is no indication that House Republicans want to make cuts to Social Security in the current debt ceiling negotiations, and House Speaker Kevin McCarthy said Medicare cuts are not on the table.

“In the State of the Union, the president said that he wanted to protect Medicare and social security from cuts,” Pierre said this week. He’s been clear about that over the past couple of years. A bill from the 1970s is not part of the president’s agenda.”

This week and in numerous previous speeches, Biden has castigated Johnson for saying last year that Medicare and Social Security should be treated as discretionary spending, which Congress has to approve every year, rather than as permanent entitlements.

I never said I wanted to end Social Security, the Democrats have been accusing me of that since I first ran for office. I’ve always been consistent: I want to save it,” he said in a radio interview this week.

It’s impossible to definitively fact-check this particular dispute without Johnson specifying how he wants to “fix” and “save” the program. His office did not reply to CNN.

The Problem of Biden and the State of the Union: How the Republicans, Social Security and Medicare will be affected by the debt ceiling crisis, and how Congress can take care of it

If the nation’s debt ceiling isn’t raised by June, a country will default on its debt. Republicans pushed for spending cuts after the rise of the Tea Party. That is a looming fight, as House Speaker Kevin McCarthy has shown little ability to corral some of the more vocal, right-wing members of his conference.

Scott said that Biden had a sunset bill in 1975, while he was a freshman senator. Every program needs to be looked at every four years, not just cost but worthiness.

The Republicans all raised their hands. So guess what? We accomplished something. They must break their word. There are going to be no cuts in Medicare, Social Security.

It’s possible that the Republicans will handle themselves differently in the next year, giving a clue to what kind of foil Biden has in this group during his expected run for president.

If Congress fails to act on Social Security and Medicare, it will cause a big problem, said Sen. Mike Rounds of South Dakota.

If we don’t have a better plan by the next 11 years, we will be in a worse position. Or we’re going to see – under existing circumstances – some reductions of as much as 24% in some sort of a benefit. So, let’s start talking now because it’s easier to fix it now that it would be five years or six years from now,” Rounds told CNN’s Jake Tapper on “State of the Union.”

Scott told CNN last week that his proposal is intended to eliminate wasteful spending and help ensure that the government can begin living within its means.

There are possibilities of long-term success without scaring people and without tearing apart the system, and that is what we think. But it requires management. He said that it requires looking at and making things better.

Dem Dems and Dems: Medicare, Social Security, and Medicaid: Who Are We Really Concerning? A Public Debate on the Future of Social Security

This time it’s Democrats accusing Republicans of wanting to maim the very popular federal health program that covers 64 million seniors and people with disabilities. Republicans have successfully pinned the Democrats as the threat to Medicare before.

McConnell spoke out against the Rick Scott plan last year, but on a Kentucky radio show in February he said that the Republican plan was not the same.

The top priority of George W. Bush at the start of his second term was to privatize Social Security. That proved singularly unpopular. The Democrats won back the House in the following elections, which was a first since 1994.

But there are many, many intermediate steps Congress could take to at least delay insolvency for both Medicare and Social Security. Some are more controversial than others (raising the payroll tax that funds Medicare, for example), but none are beyond the steps previous Congresses have taken every time the programs have neared insolvency.

The risk of healthcare inflation would be shifted from the government to seniors. And while it clearly would benefit the taxpayer, it would disadvantage both providers and the people on Medicare.

For nearly 11 minutes during the debate in October 2012, moderator Martha Raddatz of ABC skillfully guided Biden and Ryan through a heated, but civil and substantive, discussion of Social Security and Medicare’s future. Ryan said that changes were needed to preserve the long-term viability of the programs, and that seniors near retirement would not see their benefits reduced.

In fact, no Democratic presidential nominee since Al Gore in 2000 has carried most seniors in a campaign, and only Obama in 2008 carried most of the working age adults. The Republican candidate in each of the last four elections has carried over 20% of White seniors and those who are nearing retirement. In 2020, Biden marginally improved his performance with both groups but still lost to Donald Trump by 20 points among White seniors and 23 points among the Whites nearing retirement, according to the exit polls conducted by a consortium of media organizations. Biden didn’t do particularly well among older Whites without a college degree because they were heavily reliant on federal retirement programs.

As political scientists, we know that the debate over Social Security and Medicare is crucial for the upcoming presidential election because it helps to highlight who Biden is on versus who Republicans are on.

When it comes to policy, Third Way executive vice president for policy Jim Kessler said Democrats used Social Security and Medicare a lot over the past few decades. The Democrats thought the payoff would be a lot more than it was.

The question I ask myself when I am working on a campaign is whether or not you are talking about something the other side does not want to talk about. Stevens said. That is a good sign that they are losing on the issue.

Changes in seniors’ preferences could affect states like Arizona, which has a large retiree population. But the entrenched GOP advantage among older voters over the past two decades suggests Biden’s hopes in 2024 may pivot less on improving with the “gray” than maximizing his vote among the “brown”: the diverse, younger generations that recoil from the same Republican messages on culture and race that electrify so many older Whites.