Republicans won't touch your Medicare benefits. But insolvency looms without changes.
What issues really drive Republican voters to the polls? Is it cutting Medicare? Is it abolishing Social Security?
Even if Republicans gain control of both the House and Senate next week, there's little credible evidence that they will reduce Medicare, Medicaid or Social Security benefits.
Yet, Democrats have claimed for months that Republicans plan to rip the social safety net to shreds if they win back the House.
It has been a common attack line for decades – mean old Republican candidate A wants to slash Grandma's already paltry Social Security check, give the money to the rich and push her off a cliff.
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Republicans have not slashed benefits in the past
In reality, Republicans have rarely touched these programs, even when they control each branch of the federal government.
President George W. Bush proposed a partial privatization of Social Security in 2005, but it never got so much as a committee vote, even though Republicans controlled both chambers of Congress at the time.
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The last time Republicans touched Social Security was in 1983, and that was to tax Social Security benefits. The last time Republicans changed Medicare, in 2003, they created Medicare Part D, which provides recipients with an optional prescription drug benefit. Those aren't exactly slash-and-burn small-government reforms.
Yet, during a time when Republicans are more fixated on culture war issues than they are on shrinking the size of the government, Democrats are insisting that the top priority of “MAGA Republicans” is to gut these decades-old programs. Consider me skeptical.
Besides the economy and illegal immigration, Republicans seem most concerned with righting wrongs. They want Democrats to pay for what the left supposedly did to former President Donald Trump and other conservatives.
As supposed evidence of Republicans' plans to strip mine social programs, Democrats have pointed to Florida Sen. Rick Scott’s “12-point plan to rescue America.” Two sentences on page 36 stuck out to Democrats: “All federal legislation sunsets in 5 years. If a law is worth keeping, Congress can pass it again.”
Scary? Well, the senator's plan doesn't explicitly refer to Social Security, Medicare or Medicaid, and he has repeatedly insisted that his proposals represent only his ideas, not the Republican Party’s ideas.
And Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky strongly distanced the GOP Senate caucus from Scott's plan.
In September, Washington Post fact-checker Glenn Kessler gave four Pinocchios to Democrats who claimed that Republicans plan to end Social Security and Medicare.
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The Republican Study Committee did release a plan called the “Blueprint to Save America,” which proposed reforms to the programs. But the reforms are modest and intend to save the programs from insolvency.
It is true that California Rep. Kevin McCarthy, likely to become speaker if Republicans win the House, plans to use the debt-ceiling deadline as leverage to get fiscal concessions from Democrats. But based on Republicans’ limited success in past debt-ceiling crises, I doubt they'll be able to reform the programs.
What's really going on here is that Democrats are desperate to tar Republicans as extremists as the election draws closer. But Democrats don't have to be dishonest about Republicans' intentions. The truth is that the GOP has plenty it must answer for without anyone exaggerating or mischaracterizing its positions.
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Benefits programs face insolvency without changes
It's also true that problems facing Medicare and Social Security need to be addressed. Both programs, which tens of millions of Americans rely on, are on track to become insolvent unless course corrections are made.
Social Security recipients face substantial cuts in about 11 years without adjustments. Medicare may be forced to cut benefits in less than six years without changes in operations.
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Yet, there are reasonable steps – raising the retirement age for younger workers, for example – that could mitigate the pain current and future recipients will face unless changes are made. But such changes become politically possible only if both parties agree to the adjustments.
And that happens only if Democrats stop weaponizing Social Security and Medicare to scare voters away from the GOP.
Let’s be more responsible. Democrats should stop fear-mongering on the issue, and Republicans should prioritize reform. Both parties need to have a serious conversation about the future of Medicare and Social Security instead of trying to score political points against the other side.
Americans' future depends on it.
Chris Schlak is an Opinion fellow for USA TODAY. He graduated with a degree in government from The University of Texas at Austin in May. He founded and edited The Texas Horn, an Intercollegiate Studies Institute student publication at UT Austin. Follow him on Twitter: @ChrisSchlak
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This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Do Republicans want to cut Social Security? Scare tactics target GOP
