The Insurance companies and their lobbyists must have been popping champagne when Bernie Sanders’ term as chair of the HELP Committee (Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions) ended. Why? Watch this video to understand what Bernie’s perspective on healthcare is— and how he wants to deal with its ramifications and “make America healthy again,” to pick up on RFK,Jr’s catchy little phrase:
Medicare-for-All
Lower the cost of prescription drugs
Paid family and medical leave
Reform the food industry
Raise the minimum wage to a living wage
Lower the work week to 32 hours
Combat the epidemic of loneliness
Address the Climate and environmental crisis
Create high quality public educational system
Roger Marshall, a very extreme Republican— and an obstetrician— is also a member of the HELP Committee. He has a very different way at looking at health than Bernie does, basically, blame the victims and kick them while they’re down. He has long worked to repeal ObamaCare, claiming that some people “just don't want health care.” Yesterday, Peter Wade reported that as Marshall and other Republicans line up to slash healthcare the Kansas senator claims that “Americans who are sick and dying should mostly blame themselves for their health condition. ‘Look, about 70 percent of your health outcomes are determined by you,” Marshall said Sunday on Fox News’ Sunday Morning Futures. ‘It’s determined by what you eat and what you’re surrounded by. By the time you come to my office as a doctor, I can impact maybe 10 or 20 percent of your health outcomes.’ Marshall did not cite where he got those percentage figures from.”
He’s the leader of the brand new Make America Healthy Again (MAHA) Caucus and says it will work with Dr. Oz and RFK, Jr to “improv[e] health outcomes by prioritizing nutrition, providing access to affordable, nutrient-dense foods, and focusing on primary care availability to tackle the root causes of chronic diseases.”
Kennedy has frequently spouted anti-science talking points, including opposing vaccines (saying that “there’s no vaccine that is, you know, safe and effective.”) Kennedy has also threatened to fire National Institutes of Health (NIH) scientists, cut NIH and Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) budgets, and curtail infectious disease research in favor of “preventative, alternative, and holistic approaches to health.”
Marshall said that MAHA will address “nutrition,” “chronic disease issues” and the “mental health crisis.”
“We need to make these healthy foods affordable, available and try to eliminate and minimize the toxins that we’re exposed to,” Marshall told Fox News host Maria Bartiromo. “We’re coming after ultra-processed foods. They have a big problem and big challenge.”
This narrative that Americans are responsible for their own health outcomes through the choices they make at the grocery store helps justify the forthcoming gutting of health care protections and access. And it conveniently ignores other systemic social determinants of health such as poverty, racism, and economic instability.
As they try to emphasize individual responsibility for health outcomes, the incoming Trump administration and Republicans in Congress are seeking to pass legislation that would, according to the Center for Budget andPolicy Priorities, “undermine Affordable Care Act (ACA) coverage protections, make health coverage more costly and less comprehensive, shift more costs to states, and increase the number of uninsured people in the U.S.”
Marshall has voted in favor of repealing the Affordable Care Act and against protections for Americans who have preexisting conditions. He supports a free market approach to health care and has advocated for fewer restrictions on physician-owned hospitals, an industry he and his family have been heavily invested in. Marshall helped lead the transition of a surgery center into a physician-owned hospital in Kansas. And in the three years before 2020, Marshall’s wife earned somewhere between $195,000-450,000 from real estate investments in physician-owned hospitals, according to a 2020 report in the Kansas City Star.
“Just like Jesus said, ‘The poor will always be with us,’” Marshall told STAT News in 2017. “There is a group of people that just don’t want health care and aren’t going to take care of themselves.”
One thing we can be sure of: The MAHA Caucus’ claims it will focus on “nutrition,” “mental health,” and “chronic diseases,” isn’t about improving public health. It’s about excusing Republicans’ plans to slash healthcare protections. By emphasizing personal responsibility, they justify dismantling programs that ensure access to care for millions. Forget about systemic issues like poverty, food deserts, environmental racism? What about economic inequality forcing people to choose between medical bills and rent? Marshall conveniently continues to ignore those realities.
MAHA boasts allies like Dr. Oz, a quack who promoted magic diet pills on TV, and RFK Jr., who undermines public health with his anti-vaccine conspiracies. RFK Jr. has threatened to gut the NIH and CDC, curb infectious disease research, and replace evidence-based medicine with conspiracy theories and pseudoscience. Pair that with Marshall’s rhetoric, and it’s clear MAHA is a Trojan horse for rolling back the Affordable Care Act and other critical healthcare protections.
But the hypocrisy doesn’t end there. Marshall has personally profited from his supposed “free-market” healthcare solutions. He championed physician-owned hospitals— an industry in which he and his family have deep financial ties. In fact, his wife reportedly earned hundreds of thousands from investments in such hospitals. While Marshall lectures working families about the importance of eating healthier, he’s busy enriching himself by exploiting a healthcare system designed to prioritize profits over people.
Marshall’s invocation of Jesus saying “The poor will always be with us” is a convenient misreading of scripture to justify apathy. In reality, Marshall’s agenda isn’t about empowering people to live healthier lives— it’s about stripping healthcare access from those who need it most while letting billion-dollar insurance companies and private hospital owners laugh all the way to the bank. Unlike Bernie, he’s selling a vision of healthcare that blames the sick for being sick and rewards the wealthy for being wealthier. The only thing “healthy” about Marshall’s agenda is the profit margins of the corporations he serves in return for their campaign dollars.
"Yesterday, Peter Wade reported that as Marshall and other Republicans line up to slash healthcare the Kansas senator claims that “Americans who are sick and dying should mostly blame themselves for their health condition." Doesn't everyone in Congress have health insurance? How can they suggest for less Health Care benefits for the poor than they've given themselves?