MEDICARE-FOR-ALL BRAWL
Sanders, Warren clash with moderates over health care in Dem presidential debate
DETROIT — Liberal firebrands Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren slapped back against moderate rivals who ridiculed “Medicare for All” during a fierce Democratic presidential debate Tuesday night in which lesser-known pragmatists warned that “wish-list economics” would jeopardize the presidency.
The tug-of-war over the future of the party early in the 2020 season pits voters’ hearts against their heads as they balance their desperate desire to find an electable candidate to take on President Donald Trump with their strong preference for dramatic change. Over and over, Sanders and Warren insisted their plans to transform the nation’s economy and health care system make up the core of a winning message.
“I don’t understand why anybody goes to all the trouble of running for president of the United States just to talk about what we really can’t do and shouldn’t fight for,” said Warren, a Massachusetts senator, decrying Democratic “spinelessness.”
Standing at Warren’s side at center stage, Sanders, a Vermont senator, agreed: “I get a little bit tired of Democrats afraid of big ideas.”
The fight with the political left was the dominant subplot on the first night of the second round of Democratic debates.
Twenty candidates are spread evenly over two nights Tuesday and Wednesday. The second night features early front-runner Joe Biden, the former vice president, as well as Kamala Harris, a California senator.
Perhaps no issue illustrates the evolving divide within the Democratic Party more than health care.
Sanders’ plan to create a free universal health care system, known as Medicare for All, has become a litmus test for liberal candidates, who have embraced the plan to transform the current health care system despite the political and practical risks. Medicare for All would abandon the private insurance market completely in favor of a taxpayer-funded system that would cover all Americans.
In targeting Medicare for All, the more moderate candidates consistently sought to undermine the signature domestic policy proposal of the top two progressives on the stage. They variously derided Medicare for All as too costly, ineffective and a near-certain way to give Republicans the evidence they needed that Democrats supported socialism.
Yet Sanders and Warren did not back down.
“Health care is a human right, not a privilege. I believe that. I will fight for that,” Sanders said.
For his part, South Bend Mayor Pete Buttigieg called on his party to stop the infighting.
“It is time to stop worrying about what the Republicans will say,” Buttigieg declared. “It’s true that if we embrace a far-left agenda, they’re going to say we’re a bunch of crazy socialists. If we embrace a conservative agenda, you know what they’re going to do? They’re going to say we’re a bunch of crazy socialists. So let’s just stand up for the right policy, go out there and defend it.”