Medicare cuts may be a priority for Congress in 2018

With Republicans in Congress confident they’ll pass a tax cut bill before the end of the year, the question of what their top legislative priority should be in 2018 is up for debate, with some favoring a focus on cuts to federal programs like Medicare.

House Speaker Paul Ryan, R-Wisconsin, has suggested Republicans should attempt to slash spending on Medicare and Medicaid, as well as target the Affordable Care Act (ACA), through the budget reconciliation process in 2018—an approach supported by some Republicans in the Senate.

“All we do is slightly slow the rate of increased spending, but if you do that—and block-grant it—I think it will be supported by the American people,” Sen. Ron Johnson, R-Wisconsin, told the Washington Post. “It depends on how you do it, but I think there’d be a fair amount of support to send those dollars [for Medicare and Medicaid] back to the states.”

Other Republican senators however, were uneasy about the idea of going after Medicare in an election year. A May poll by the Pew Research Center found only 5 percent of Democrat voters and 15 percent of Republican voters want to cut Medicare.

“I don’t know if there’s any appetite for true entitlement reform,” said Sen. Tim Scott, R-South Carolina. “I haven’t heard of any.”

Another possibility is leaving Medicare alone but instead pursuing Medicaid changes through the Graham-Cassidy ACA repeal bill which had been shelved in September.

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