Assemblyperson McDonald warns that Trump will take healthcare back to where it was before Obama
John T. McDonald, the Assemblyperson for NY's 108th Assembly District, spoke at a Zoom Town Hall event sponsored by the Waterford Democratic Committee on July 16th. John began with a statement about the upcoming cuts to Medicaid, and what he saw as the primary problems Upstate New York will experience due to draconian changes to Medicaid eligibility. In his opening statement, he said that “there's simply no doubt” that Trump and the Big Bad Blunder of a budget resolution bill passed by Trump's Republican Congressional Cult will take NY healthcare back to where it was before Obama. This will result, he said, in a huge increase in the number of uninsured New Yorkers and a dangerous decline in medical services that will include hospital and clinic closures in rural areas, and lack of access to medical care for the poor across the state.
McDonald also noted that the design of the legislation was to shove off the most painful part of the budget reductions till 2027, meaning that if Democrats should win one or both houses of the U.S. Congress, they will be the ones forced to deal with it. This would include work requirements for Medicaid recipients aged 19 – 64, which begins January 1, 2027. McDonald said that the strategy of creating this timeline was to keep Medicaid cuts from being a 2026 election issue, but that the Democratic Party not allow this to happen, and should make Medicaid cuts a front and center issue in next year's elections in order to reinforce that it is the GOP that is willing to literally kill Americans by restricting access to healthcare for all.
A more immediate issue for elder care, he said, is the extreme pressure being put on legal immigrants. He explained that the staff of most nursing homes is largely composed of green-card holding immigrants who are being deported, or frightened into leaving the United States. Without these immigrants, nursing homes will not be able to provide services, resulting in fewer available beds and lower quality of care. That problem is true throughout New York.
McDonald also spoke to the problem in higher education that will result from rule changes at the university administrative level, as well as with student loan access. While access to community colleges may have been made easier, he is concerned that New Yorkers will not be able to engage in the kind of upper-level university studies and research that play a huge part in making New York one of the top U.S. educational centers.
The exchange between the audience, who represented the entire four-county Capital District and beyond, lasted for 90 minutes. The Assemblyperson answered all questions in the forthright and non-evasive way that local voters who know him have come to see as a hallmark of his legislative tenure. The Waterford Democratic Committee extends a huge “Thanks!” to John … and to his staffmembers who helped facilitate arrangements for the event. We are truly fortunate, here in Waterford and throughout the 108th, to be represented by McDonald in the New York Legislature.
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