- 6/4/2025
Senate Democrats held a press briefing on Wednesday about the Big Beautiful Bill.
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00:00Willie Stark. Who is Willie Stark? Question. Anyone know? Willie Stark, no. Willie
00:09Stark was the fictional name of Huey Long in All the King's Men, which is my
00:14favorite political novel. Robert Penn Warren. Indeed. One of the best pieces of
00:19writing. Ever. It begins about the highway. The highway. You don't read our writing?
00:25That's right. We do. We hang on your every word. Okay. Thank you. Thank you for
00:36coming. I want to thank Senator Wyden and Hassan for joining me. Well, we've all
00:40been hearing about how devastating the cuts to Medicaid and health care have
00:46been. Well, it's getting even worse. The more you look at the bill, at the House
00:52bill, the worse it gets. CBO is about to announce that it could go from 13 million
00:59to 0.7 million people who would lose their coverage up to as many as 16 million. And
01:05new calculations will show that even Medicare is under the knife. So this is
01:12health care across the board. It is, of course, Medicaid, as important as that is.
01:17It is ACA. It is private insurance, which is going to skyrocket. It's everything that
01:25is terrible. So the news got even worse, got even worse when you thought it couldn't get
01:30much worse. The bottom line is very simple. People with this bill, tens of millions who would
01:39otherwise qualify for health care benefits would be mummified in new red tape, shortened enrollment
01:48periods, higher premiums, and weaker coverage. People will fall through the cracks and get phased
01:53out of coverage in the coming years. Death by a thousand paper cuts. That's the intention of the
02:01Republican bill. And we all know one thing. Donald Trump is just lying about the bill. Lying about
02:09the bill. Well, here's the We Are All Going to Die Act. It says nearly 14 million. It's 16 million.
02:18Getting closer to 16 million, according to CBO's numbers, we've been told. 11 million people cut off
02:24from affordable food, tax cuts for billionaires. We're all going to die, Bill. And that shows the
02:31callousness, the callousness of this Republican majority in the House and the Republican majority
02:39in the Senate. Repeal and replace? It's that by another name. That by another name.
02:46And just don't take my word for it. Look at Senate Republicans. We heard what Joni Ernst said. We're
02:55all going to die. How about John Kennedy? Not the former John Kennedy president, but our present
03:03Senator John Kennedy. He said, I'm not worried about people losing their health care. We remember the
03:09great Commerce Secretary, Lutnik. Well, if my mom missed a payment on Social Security, it wouldn't
03:16matter. Of course, they have a billionaire son-in-law. But when Joni Ernst said people will die,
03:24she summed up the callousness of the whole Republican majority in terms of people's health.
03:31And health is our greatest gift. Despite the lies that Republicans have been telling Americans
03:38and maybe themselves, there's a cold, harsh reality that this bill is just tax breaks for the
03:46ultra-wealthy, paid for by gutting health care for up to 16 million Americans. And by the way,
03:53small business owners are going to see their premiums skyrocket. You know how many people,
03:57I believe, at the end of the day, because so many hospitals will close or lay off people,
04:03that I believe it could be, you know, certainly hundreds of thousands and maybe even over a million
04:08people losing their jobs. This is across-the-board disaster for the American people.
04:16Now, Donald Trump is trying to lie about it. But let me tell our Republican Senate colleagues,
04:23what will be enacted is not Donald Trump's soothing words, but the actual reality of harsh cuts where
04:30people lose health care, where people's premiums go up, where hospitals close, nursing homes close,
04:35and people are laid off. So anyone who thinks they're voting for the nice words of Donald Trump
04:40will face a harsh reality when this is implemented. And they've moved up the implementation date as
04:45well to 2026. You know what that means? More hospitals close, more people are laid off.
04:51Health care providers don't get any time to try and adjust to the harsh reality that Republican
04:58House members and Republican senators want to impose on them. Over 850,000 people, it's estimated,
05:08will lose their jobs. And I think that estimate is low. I think it could go well over a million jobs lost.
05:15Over 10 million people who signed up for their insurance during the last month are healthy young
05:20people. Their costs are going to go up much higher. It affects the babies. It affects the kids. It
05:29affects the young people starting out with families. It affects the elderly across the board. It is just
05:35terrible. Now, Trump and the Republicans claim they want to fight fraud. Bull. Bull. They just pardoned
05:44a horrible nursing homeowner. I think he got 10 years. I don't remember. But he got a big, long sentence
05:53who committed fraud by taking money from the doctors and the nurses and the aides in his nursing home.
05:58They say they want to cut fraud. Then why'd they get rid of the IGs
06:03who are in charge of fraud? That's bull. They can't say it because they know how unpopular it is,
06:10but they just want to strangle health care and all it does for people. Okay?
06:23Let me just say this. For many Americans, health care coverage is the difference between life and
06:29death. But, according to Ernst, fear not, we're going to die anyway. Tell that. The American people
06:37have heard it. Let me be clear. Democrats are ready. We are ready to fight. We are doubling down.
06:45We're ready to show Americans what's really at stake here because this fight won't be won in just the
06:50Capitol. As Abe Lincoln said, public sentiment is everything. And when public sentiment hears about
06:58this, we're all going to die act, they're going to hate it. And they're going to tell their senators
07:02they hate it. And if the senators think they can get away with a yes vote and explain it,
07:07they're sadly mistaken. The cuts are too deep. The cuts are too real. The cuts are too devastating for
07:13people. Okay?
07:18And finally, why are they doing all this? Why are they being so mean? Why are they being so cruel? And
07:23why are they being so politically tin-eared at best, suicidal at worst? All to give tax breaks to
07:34billionaires. They are in total obeisance, Donald Trump is, and his colleagues are, to very, very,
07:40this small group of very wealthy, greedy people who say, I don't care what you do to everyone else,
07:45cut my taxes. And, by the way, get rid of any regulations. Senator Wyden.
07:49Senator Wyden. Thank you very much, Mr. Leader. And let me pick up on where the leader
07:57stopped. The legislation has rapidly become an anti-senior bill. And let me walk you through
08:07why that's the case. A million low-income seniors are going to see their Medicare premiums go up
08:15by nearly $200 a month. The bill makes nursing homes less safe for frail seniors because it rolls back
08:28safety standards. For example, Mehmet Oz somehow thinks that AI is going to take care of everything
08:36that seniors need in rest homes. We pointed out to him that's not going to help an 85-year-old
08:44who's up in the middle of the night and have to make the way to the bathroom. The bill's going to
08:51hurt hundreds of thousands of seniors by reducing services for those who count on Medicaid to lose
09:00care at home. And then the American people have heard some things about Medicaid in this bill and being so
09:11harmful. They're going to also learn that this bill would trigger $500 billion in Medicare cuts.
09:20This is going to hurt rural hospitals like a wrecking ball. Now, if you're an older person in America,
09:29this is also going to come on top of the Trump administration backing away from efforts to lower
09:38prescription drug costs. And we feel that this is a hugely big mistake. We work very hard to get the
09:47power to negotiate more affordable medicine for seniors. And all these cuts in senior programs that
09:56I've mentioned, they come on top of the Trump message to seniors. We're not really much interested
10:04in holding down your costs of medicine. Now, as the leader touched on, the latest numbers from CBO
10:12released two hours ago, make it clear that there are going to be more than a trillion dollars in cuts
10:19to Americans' health care. And we do expect to hear later today that even more Americans are going to
10:28be losing their health insurance than the initial estimates from the nonpartisan budget office have
10:34disclosed. But I do think that the American people want to know what's actually going on. And
10:43particularly for the seniors, who I've known since my days when I was director of the Great Panthers,
10:49they have a right to know what incredibly harmful provisions are in the text of this legislation as of
10:57now. There's been some discussion about Medicaid. But you all, and I'm a journalist kid, can now go out and
11:04tell the elderly of this country how this bill is going to affect them. Because they have a right
11:10to know, and they aren't going to like it. This morally bankrupt bill boils down to a simple equation.
11:16As the leader touched on, health care cuts for Americans walking on an economic tightrope is what
11:21this bill is all about. And it's going to be paid for by extra tax breaks for the ultra-wealthy. Senator
11:28Hassan and I are members of the Finance Committee. You can be sure we'll be fighting this every step of the
11:33way. And as the leader noted, we are going to use every single tool at our disposal to fight this.
11:40I don't think the Republicans even want to talk about the specifics. The three of us, the leader
11:45and I have our roots in the Finance Committee. We remember the days when Republicans wanted to go into
11:50the Finance Committee, have markup. They don't want to go into the Finance Committee and have markups,
11:55because they don't want to talk about all the health care cuts they're hitting people with.
11:59So Senator Schumer, our leader, and Senator Hassan, very pleased to be with both of you.
12:04Thank you. Thank you, leader.
12:08Well, good afternoon. Great, Senator Hassan, one of our leaders on health care.
12:12Well, thank you, Leader Schumer. Thank you, Chairman Wyden,
12:16Ranking Member Wyden, for your remarks and for your leadership. Thank you all for being here this
12:22afternoon. Look, President Trump and congressional Republicans continue to push forward a bill that
12:29gives more tax breaks to billionaires and corporate special interests paid for by trillions being added
12:36to the national debt, paid for by taking health care coverage away from 36,000 granite staters and
12:44millions of Americans and triggering nearly 500 billion dollars in cuts to Medicare. Just last week,
12:51I met with granite staters, including in New Hampshire's rural north country, and I heard about
12:58what will truly be a devastating impact that these health care cuts will have on both the people who
13:03need health care and on the ability of providers who want to serve patients to keep their doors open.
13:12Khadisha, a young mother in Nashua, New Hampshire, in the southern part of the state,
13:17talked to me about the services that her son with autism gets because he has Medicaid coverage,
13:23occupational therapy, physical therapy, behavioral therapy. He's making great progress.
13:28All of that is now at risk because of this bill. Now, Medicaid can be the difference between life
13:36or death for people and families. The difference between getting care for diabetes, for addiction,
13:42or cancer are having these diseases go untreated. And seniors across our state have paid into Medicare
13:51their entire working lives based on the promise that the Medicare system will provide health care for
13:57them when they retire. This bill, one of the largest health care cuts in the history of the United
14:05States. Let me repeat that. This is one of the largest health care cuts in the history of the United
14:11States, will result in more untreated diseases, packed emergency rooms, and even higher prescription drug
14:19prices. Just last week, someone I know was at one of our local hospitals emergency room,
14:24the wait for treatment for a routine infection in that emergency room was seven hours.
14:32That's a real problem, and it will only get much worse if this bill passes. And as people
14:40lose their coverage and don't get care, rural providers who count on these patients will have
14:46to severely cut back their services or close their doors altogether. Now, let me tell you what's
14:51happening for pregnant women in my state. For a pregnant woman in labor, as you all know, every minute
14:57feels like an hour. In New Hampshire, the median driving time to a labor and delivery unit has already
15:05doubled over the last decade to 40 minutes. If more hospitals have to close their labor and delivery
15:12units because of these Medicaid cuts, that time will grow even longer. And let's also be clear,
15:18especially in the northern part of my state, if it's wintertime, that 40-minute drive may be a
15:25life-threatening drive in and of itself, and it will take much longer. We've seen an uptick in New
15:31Hampshire in births that occur in unplanned locations. Just in January, a couple who ended up having,
15:38she had a home birth because she couldn't get to the hospital in time. For older and disabled
15:45granite staters, you know, I heard in the North Country last week about a woman in her 80s who
15:51lives alone with her adult disabled son, who needs a community health worker to navigate the paperwork
15:59to apply for Medicaid and get the redetermination every year for her adult disabled son.
16:05She can't get through the paperwork without the help of a community health worker,
16:09and community health worker positions are being cut by this administration. So these new rules will
16:17have real impacts on people like my constituent, who I just described, and her disabled son.
16:23The bottom line here is clear. If congressional Republicans and Donald Trump get their way
16:30and pass their bill to give billionaires and corporate special interests more tax breaks
16:35at the expense of the middle class, more people will get sick, health providers will be impacted,
16:42our economy will be weakened, and families will be hurt. And last thing, I want to remind people that my
16:51colleagues and I on both sides of the aisle have, in fact, put forward a number of bipartisan proposals to
16:58lower health care costs. There's real work to be done in this area. But if my Republican colleagues
17:04are willing to abandon their dangerous partisan bill, we could actually do this work together and
17:13actually lower costs, health care costs for our constituents. But right now, it appears that they
17:20are determined to pass this devastating bill. We're going to continue to speak out about the harms that
17:28it will cause, about the trillions it will add to our deficit, about the health care providers who will
17:34need to close their doors, about the real dangers this provides to the health, the security,
17:41and the economy of our states and our country. Thank you.
17:45Well done, Maggie Hassan. Just again, so you heard, everything's getting worse. The more you look at the
17:51bill, the worse it gets. It's now a trillion dollars in cuts. It's over 800,000 job loss, many of them in
17:59nursing homes and rural hospitals. Just remember, they depend on Medicaid disproportionately. I've been
18:05in nursing homes in downstate, upstate, rural. They're all worried they're going to close. 70,
18:1180 percent of their revenue is Medicaid. Same with rural hospitals. And then you add the Medicare
18:17problems to it and the health care provider. Some of the bigger hospitals are going to be devastated and
18:21have to lay off people and not be able to treat people as well. But for the rural hospitals and the
18:27smaller hospitals, this is really death. And the bottom line is this is going to be devastating in
18:36America. I think if our Republican colleagues, God forbid, they pass this bill and it becomes law,
18:42could turn the clock a year ahead, they'd all say, why did we do that? Why did we do that?
18:48Questions on this subject? Yes, ma'am.
18:50GOP lawmakers have defended some of their budget bills, Medicaid reforms, by highlighting
18:59CBO projections of roughly 1.4 million illegal immigrants losing their coverage under state-funded
19:08health programs. Is reducing federal Medicaid payments to states that provide coverage to
19:13undocumented immigrants a reform? Look, the bottom line is this overall bill is so awful. If they
19:20want to aim, if they've got some specific issues, aim it. Don't just do a meat-axe or a chainsaw
19:28across the board and cut everything, everything, everything. I don't know if their numbers are
19:34accurate. These are GOP numbers. But it doesn't matter. The bottom line is this goes way beyond
19:40even what they're talking about and hurts everybody. Next question. Next question.
19:45Considering Elon Musk's opposition to this bill and the fact that he has not returned the call
19:51of the Speaker of the House, according to the Speaker, would you try to bring him into the fold
19:56to help kill this bill in the Senate? He's not my cup of tea, to put it mildly. But Republicans are
20:02already listening to him. They're already listening to him. You've heard some of the right-wing groups
20:08to uplift Elon Musk against Donald Trump. Anyway, yes? One of the things that it sounds like he wants
20:15is to bring back the EB tax credit that's been taken out of the reconciliation. Is that another thing
20:21that you agree with Elon Musk? Well, I spoke on the floor, I spoke on the floor about what they're doing
20:26overall in energy is just ridiculous. A, it's going to raise people's costs, thousands of dollars in
20:32terms of their power costs. Number two, over 840,000 jobs will be lost. And number three,
20:38it gives all the keys to China. So we have to revamp the entire energy package. And I'm meeting with,
20:44I've met several times with my Democratic, seven or eight of my Democratic colleagues. I think Senator
20:49Wyden was in those meetings. And we're reaching out to Republican colleagues, as are the industries that
20:58are affected. Eighty percent of these new clean energy industries are in Republican states. The
21:04whole thing needs revamping. The whole thing needs revamping, just like in health care. Yes?
21:09Do you urge members to vote against the Genius Act on any final votes?
21:12I voted no. There's division in our caucus on that issue. The reason I voted no is because it did
21:20nothing to stop Donald Trump and his family from engaging in self-aggrandizing, self-enriching
21:27activities. Yes?
21:28OMB sent a rescission package to the Hill. And I'm wondering what you think about that in light of
21:35Russell's argument that he doesn't need to do this, so they have the right to impound funds. Do you
21:39think that sending that rescission package kind of undermines his political point?
21:42Well, I think the bottom line is the rescission package is something that we Democrats very much
21:48vehemently oppose. How are you going to have a budget? How are you going to put together budgets if
21:54they're then going to try to do rescissions? What's the point of doing a budget? But the good
21:58news is there are a good number of Republicans who don't like it either. Last one.
22:12Look, we're going to fight the rescission. They haven't even sent it over to us yet, so we can't
22:17comment on what's going to, you know, we'll see what happens in the House. But I think there's broad
22:22Democratic opposition to the rescissions package. Okay? Thank you, everybody. Thank you, guys.