Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) told Republicans on Tuesday in a closed-door meeting that voters concerned about significant cuts to Medicaid in the Senate budget bill will eventually “get over it.”
“I know a lot of us are hearing from people back home about Medicaid,” McConnell said, according to Punchbowl News. “But they’ll get over it.”
The Senate version of the Trump-backed ‘One Big Beautiful Bill’ calls for deeper Medicaid cuts than the House passed version. The Senate version would expand Medicaid work requirements to include the parents of older children, not just adults without children.
The Senate bill also clamps down on state-directed payments and Medicaid provider taxes, two tactics states use to increase Medicaid funding to hospitals especially in rural areas.
The bill calls for significant cut to the taxes states can levy on medical providers, according to The Hill. States impose taxes on providers to boost their federal Medicaid contributions, which they then direct back to hospitals in the form of higher reimbursements.
The bill caps provider taxes at 3.5 percent by 2031, down from the current 6 percent.
Republicans have faced hostile town halls with constituents since the bill passed the House and it is raising concerns among some in the party that the bill could lead to a wipeout in the midterm elections.
In a statement to Newsweek, a spokesperson for McConnell said his comments were taken out of context.
“Senator McConnell was speaking about the people who are abusing Medicaid – the able-bodied Americans who should be working — and the need to withstand Democrats’ scare tactics when it comes to Medicaid,” the spokesperson said.
“Senator McConnell was urging his fellow members to highlight that message to our constituents and remind them that we should all be against waste, fraud, and abuse while working to protect our rural hospitals and have safety nets in place for people that need it,” they added.
