Fact Check: Ivanka Trump Says Trump’s Actions Have Cut Drug Prices But Drug Prices Have Gone Up
Recently, he took dramatic action cut the cost of prescription drugs despite fielding angry calls from the CEOs of every major pharmaceutical company, the president’s daughter Ivanka Trump said Thursday night during her primetime address. Now, when we see an attack ad paid for by Big Pharma, my dad smiles and says to me, You know were doing something really right if theyre hitting us so hard.
This is misleading. Drug prices have risen during Trumps administration, and gone up steadily during the pandemic. And while Trump has talked up taking decisive action, his orders remain secret.
Ivanka Trump noted in her speech that while some voters may not be too keen on her fathers tweets, the results speak for themselves.
Twitter lit up in response.
Needless to say, some felt the results did speak for themselves. But not in a good way.
Case in point: Ivanka Trump highlighting her fathers actions on the coronavirus and the shutting down parts of the economy to combat the pandemic that has killed over 180,000 people in the U.S.
But as some pointed out, Trump was unable to lead a response that curtailed the outbreak while things were shut down, leaving the disease raging well into the summer months.
: The results speak for themselves.
Ivanka Trump, in her Thursday night RNC speech, claimed that her father rapidly mobilized the full force of government and the private sector to produce ventilators within weeks.
Medicare Medicaid Social Security: Trump’s Proposed Budget Slashes Entitlementsand Campaign Promises
President Donald Trump has vowed over the course of his presidency not to cut federal spending for entitlement programs such as Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security. But his $4.8 trillion budget proposal for fiscal year 2021, unveiled Monday, seeks to do just that.
The White House budget, which is a proposal that congressional appropriators can choose whether to take into consideration when it’s offered by the administration each year, would cut billions from the three major safety-net programs over the next decade. It’s unclear in what way and by how much the slash in funding to agencies that oversee the programs would affect recipients’ benefits.
The proposed decrease in funding comes despite promises, made as recently as the morning of the budget unveiling, to not alter the level of funding for programs that many poor and elderly Americans depend on each year.
“We’re not touching Medicare,” Trump told a group of governors gathered for a White House event on Monday. “We’re not touching Social Security.”
The president made a similar claim in a tweet over the weekend.
“We will not be touching your Social Security or Medicare in Fiscal 2021 Budget,” he wrote. “Only the Democrats will destroy them by destroying our Country’s greatest ever Economy!”
The acting director of the Office of Management and Budget, Russell Vought, rejected the perception of significant cuts and said the programs will grow with the economy.
Fact Check: ‘record’ Job Gains Still Leave The Us Labor Market In Worse Shape Than Great Recession
On the last night of his partys convention, President Trump bragged about record job gains in recent months, but the 9.1 million jobs he touts come with some qualifiers.
“Over the past three months, we have gained over nine million jobs, and thats a record in the history of our country,” Trump said Thursday.
The recent job gains are still less than half the number of jobs the economy shed in March and April at the height of pandemic-ordered lockdowns. From March through July, the economy lost a net 12.9 million jobs, the most in American history.
The nearly 2 million jobs added in July also represent a sharp slowdown from the almost 5 million jobs added in June.
And several major groups of workers are at greater risk of falling behind. Black unemployment, at 14.6 percent in July, registered less than a percentage point of improvement. Among Hispanics, the rate of unemployment also remained elevated at nearly 13 percent, compared to just nearly 9 percent for white workers.
It still has a long way to go, and risks falling back in as the pandemic continues to rage and causes more layoffs and curtails hiring, he said.
President Trump spoke for roughly 70 minutes on Thursday, one of the longest convention speeches in modern history.
The president is known to insert new material into his speeches on the trail. It just wasnt the case in one of the biggest speeches of his presidency.
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Things To Watch For On Night 4 Of The Rnc
Shannon Pettypiece
President Trump has had nearly four years in office to sell his performance to the American people. So far, polls suggest he has yet to make the sale: A majority of Americans disapprove of the job he’s done, and he has consistently trailed Joe Biden in general election surveys this year.
So what can he say on the final night of the Republican National Convention to change those attitudes and convince Americans he deserves four more years in office? Republican strategists say they are looking for him to give a vision of what he would do in a second term an area he has struggled to define and how that would contrast with a Biden presidency.
Whatever message Trump delivers on the final night of the gathering, he will be competing for attention with a Category 4 hurricane that made landfall Thursday morning.
President Trump will focus his Republican National Convention speech Thursday on attacking Joe Biden, according to excerpts of his address.
At no time before have voters faced a clearer choice between two parties, two visions, two philosophies, or two agendas,” Trump will say, according to excerpts of the speech from his campaign.
Trump Proposed Cuts But Congress Didnt Bite
As a candidate, Donald Trump promised to make no cuts to Social Security. As president, he has periodically proposed policies that would cut aspects of the program, but so far, none of them have been enacted.
Trump released a proposed budget for 2021, as he had in previous years, that advocated cutting two disability programs administered by the Social Security Administration: Social Security Disability Insurance and Supplemental Security Income. Collectively, the two programs serve millions of Americans.
SSDI and SSI are separate from and smaller than the agency’s main retirement income program. SSDI benefits people with physical and mental conditions that are severe enough to permanently keep them from working. It is funded by Social Security payroll taxes. Meanwhile, SSI payments are limited to low-income Americans senior citizens, or adults or children who are disabled or blind. The payments are funded through general revenue from the Treasury.
Trump’s actions very well should have earned him a Promise Broken. He tried multiple times to break his own promise. But our promise meters are about outcomes. We’ve gotten complaints over the years about promises that couldn’t happen because they were blocked by Congress, but we repeatedly rated them on the outcome.
In this case, a Promise Broken rating would suggest that seniors had their Social Security benefits cut. But that isn’t the case.
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What You Should Know About The Gop And Social Security
Whos to blame for this mess? Well, some Americans would point their fingers specifically at Republicans in Congress. While they absolutely do take some of the blame, the inaction by Republicans and Democrats on Capitol Hill makes them equally culpable in exacerbating Social Securitys problems.
When it comes to Republicans and Social Security, here are the four things you absolutely need to know.
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Did They Back Up Their Claim
Linked inside the tweet was a letter from Stephen C. Goss, the chief actuary of the Social Security Administration. In this letter, which was penned at the request of four Democratic senators, Goss explains the effects of a permanent payroll tax cut. Goss letter states that, f this hypothetical legislation were enacted we estimate that Trust Fund asset reserves would become permanently depleted in about the middle of calendar year 2021, and also that Trust Fund reserves would become permanently depleted by the middle of calendar year 2023.
This is a memo from a government official that describes what would happen if payroll taxes were to be permanently cut and no alternative source of revenue was used to pay for these benefits. But is that the presidents plan?
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Dont Count On A Switch To The Chained Cpi Anytime Soon
Now, before you start worrying about a reduction in your current or future Social Security benefit check, let me caution that a switch to the Chained CPI from the CPI-W appears highly unlikely anytime soon.
For one, President Trump has been pretty adamant about not making direct changes to the Social Security program. Trump has argued that indirect solutions that boost economic growth, thereby leading to an increase in payroll tax collection, should be more than enough to improve the health of the program.
More important, there would need to be bipartisan cooperation in Washington in order to pass such a measure and none exists right now. Any amendment to the Social Security program requires 60 votes in the Senate, and its been four decades since either party had a supermajority in the upper House of Congress. Theres virtually no way Democrats would support switching to the Chained CPI when they have their own inflationary tether change proposal on the table.
Since 2000, the purchasing power of Social Security income has fallen by 33%, and it doesnt look as if this trend will slow anytime soon.
Wife Of Retired Police Captain Killed In George Floyd Protests Who Gave Emotional Plea Is Exploiting His Death Daughters Say
Dartunorro Clark
The daughters of David Dorn, a retired police captain who was shot and killed outside a burglarized St. Louis pawn shop during protests stemming from George Floyd’s death, told The St. Louis American that his widow is exploiting his death to bolster President Trumps agenda.
We know his wife is a Trump supporter, but he was not, Debra White, his daughter, told the paper, referring to his widow, St. Louis Police Sgt. Ann Dorn. He frequently said they were not able to talk about politics, because they were at the opposite ends of the spectrum. I know he would not want his legacy to be for his death to be used to further Trumps law-and-order agenda.
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Harris Speech Will ‘prosecute The Case Against Trump’ Aide Says
Kristen Welker
Just hours before Donald Trump delivers his acceptance speech tonight, the Democratic vice presidential nominee, Sen. Kamala Harris, is expected to unleash her harshest criticism yet of the president and his handling of the coronavirus pandemic.
She will prosecute the case against Trump, one Harris aide told NBC News.
Harris will speak at 3 p.m. in Washington on President Trump’s failures to contain COVID-19 and protect working families from the economic fallout and the Biden-Harris plan to contain COVID-19 and build a different path forward in America, according to a press release.
Harris has done some virtual campaign events but this will be her first public appearance since the Democratic convention. The campaign is framing this as a response to the RNC and a prebuttal of the president. She isnt taking questions afterward and neither she nor Biden have traveled anywhere since she was named his running mate in contrast to Trump and Vice President Mike Pence, who have crisscrossed the country over the same period.
The Democrats had previewed a robust counterprogramming effort this week, and while some top surrogates have held phone calls and briefings with reporters, so far their efforts have failed to break through, particularly against the backdrop of another Black man being shot and killed by police, this time in Kenosha, Wisconsin, and Hurricane Laura. Harris will address Kenosha with emphasis, an aide said.
Huge Crowds Gather To Both Watch And Protest Trump Speech
Jeff Van Drew, the New Jersey Republican who changed his party affiliation after voting against Donald Trumps impeachment, will speak at the Republican convention on Thursday.
Van Drew joins a limited number of Democrats or former Democrats who spoke on Trumps behalf at his re-nominating convention. It provides a contrast with Biden, who featured higher-profile Republicans speaking at his event.
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Medicare And Social Security’s Finances Are Already Shaky
Economists from the left-leaning Center for American Progress warned on Thursday that Trump’s push to enact a payroll tax cut could further erode their shaky finances.
“Trump’s scheme would weaken the Social Security and Medicare trust funds by diverting the revenue from the employee portion of Social Security and Medicare taxes, and potentially the employer’s share of Medicare taxes, from the programs’ trust funds,” a memo from the organization said.
Around $500 billion in payroll taxes went into the trust funds of both programs from August to December of last year, the Center for American Progress said.
The trust funds for both programs are scheduled to be depleted in this decade. The Bipartisan Policy Center projects that if economic damage was similar to the Great Recession a decade ago, the Social Security trust funds could be depleted in 2029. That could prompt a 31% cut in retirement benefits, the organization said.
The Medicare trust fund is in worse shape. Its trustees said the program would run out of money in 2026 also without accounting for the pandemic.
First Read: Real World Chaos Undercuts Trump’s Convention Message
Chuck Todd, Mark Murray, Carrie Dann and Melissa Holzberg
WASHINGTON For most of this year, the events of 2020 have overshadowed the actual presidential campaign. And its happening again as the Republican convention concludes and with 68 days until Election Day.
A powerful hurricane has slammed into the Louisiana-Texas Gulf Coast. The shooting of Jacob Blake by police has resulted in unrest, further violence and the arrest of a 17-year-old charged with murder during the protests. Also because of the Blake shooting, professional athletes from the NBA and WNBA, to Major League Baseball, Major League Soccer and tennis star Naomi Osaka walked off their respective courts and playing fields.
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Trump Calls For Making Permanent Cuts To Both The Medicare And Social Security Payroll Taxes
President Trump said over the weekend, “If I’m victorious on November 3rd, I plan to forgive these and make permanent cuts to the payroll tax.”
Currently, employers and employees split the 12.4% payroll tax on the first $137,700 of 2020 earnings and also split the 2.9% Medicare tax on all earnings. The self-employed pay the entire tax.
Trump not only wants to suspend these taxes during the pandemic crisis, he says he wants to make permanent cuts to these taxes.
First, the only people who pay these taxes are people who still have their jobs and their earnings. With millions unemployed it can be argued that it would make more sense to increase deficit spending by providing help directly to those who don’t have any earningsthe unemployed.
But the bigger question revolves around the suspension of funding to Medicare and Social Securityparticularly permanent cuts.
Both the Medicare and Social Security trust funds are running out of moneyboth face an inability to pay full benefits if their problems aren’t solved by either increasing funding or cutting benefits. That is projected by the Congressional Budget Office to happen for Medicare in 2025 and Social Security in 2031.
