Elizabeth Warren claims that if she were to win the presidency that she would not raise taxes for anyone who is not a billionaire.
And yet, she claims to also be able to find $52 trillion over the next decade, including $20.5 trillion in new federal spending, to afford her “Medicare for all” proposal.
“Sure, for Medicare for All, it [the cut off] is a billion dollars … no increases in taxes for anyone except billionaires, period,” she said during a recent campaign stop.
Check it out:
NEWS: @ewarren told me her Medicare for All proposal won't raise taxes for anyone with under $1 billion after I asked who's in the "middle class" she promises not to raise taxes for pic.twitter.com/9u1e6ApGMi
— Zak Hudak (@cbszak) November 3, 2019
Moments later, @joshjame clarified: "Is there a salary or income that you would define as middle class when you say 'No middle class taxes?'" @ewarren said: "Sure, for Medicare for All, it's a billion dollars … no increases in taxes for anyone except billionaires, period." pic.twitter.com/EteAhSpAB6
— Zak Hudak (@cbszak) November 3, 2019
Warren claims she can come up with the funds to cover her proposal but the figures and the facts do not seem to support her, the Biden campaign said in a statement.
Biden For President Deputy Campaign Manager and Communications Director Kate Bedingfield highlighted the discrepancy in a statement.
“The American people have to be able to trust whoever our party nominates to take on Donald Trump to be straight with them about health care,” she said in the statement. “Senator Warren said tonight that her single-payer plan won’t raise taxes on anyone but billionaires, but that’s simply not true. Her plan would create a new tax on employers of almost $9 trillion that would come out of workers’ pockets, a new financial transition tax that would impact investments held by the middle-class Americans and a new capital gains tax that would affect far more people than she stated tonight.”
“What’s more, Senator Warren has been lowballing the cost of her plan by well over $10 trillion while overcounting the revenue that would be gained from the sources she identifies. The bottom line? Even more tax increases on the middle class will be inevitable,” the statement continued.
“Senator Warren has spent months dodging questions about how she needs to raise taxes on the American middle class in order to pay for her single-payer health care plan, and on Friday she confirmed why: because her plan would,” it concluded.
This is extraordinary. Elizabeth Warren says that anyone who is not a *billionaire* won’t pay higher taxes under her healthcare plan. That is simply false. Her financial transaction tax, her employer tax, and her capital gains tax would all clearly affect non-billionaires. https://t.co/yU4tQLAdEk
— Ryan Lizza (@RyanLizza) November 3, 2019
Townhall reports in another statement, the Biden campaign said: “The mathematical gymnastics in this plan are all geared towards hiding a simple truth from voters: it’s impossible to pay for Medicare for All without middle-class tax increases. For months, Elizabeth Warren has refused to say if her health care plan would raise taxes on the middle class, and now we know why: because it does. Sen. Warren would place a new tax of nearly $9 trillion that will fall on American workers.”
The Warren campaign pushed back.
“The cost projections that we have on Medicare were authenticated by President Obama’s head of Medicare. Our revenue projections were authenticated by President Obama’s labor economist. And the employer contribution is already part of the Affordable Care Act that President Obama put into the Affordable Care Act,” Warren told a group of reporters, the Hill reports. “So if Joe Biden doesn’t like that, I’m just not sure where he’s going.”
"If Joe Biden doesn't like that, I'm just not sure where he's going."
WATCH: Sen. Elizabeth Warren responds to Joe Biden calling her Medicare for All plan "mathematical gymnastics" and impossible to pay for without middle class tax increases. pic.twitter.com/d3PbJF8Oj2
— The Hill (@thehill) November 1, 2019