Rep. Ted Lieu (D-Calif.) went after a new bill introduced by Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) that would repeal Medicaid cuts that President Trump signed into law earlier this month.
“One thing the bill does is for any Republican that’s been saying, ‘Oh, these weren’t actually cuts to Medicaid,’ it shows a lie to that,” Lieu said at the Hill Nation Summit, alluding to the GOP-backed “big, beautiful bill.”
Hawley’s bill, introduced Tuesday, would repeal provisions that limit states’ ability to tax health care providers, which most states use to fund their Medicaid obligations. It would also repeal a cap on state-directed payments, which are used to manage how Medicaid plans pay certain providers.
Many of those existing measures were enacted as part of the One Big Beautiful Bill Act signed by President Trump on July 4. Hawley was one of several Senate Republicans who initially waffled on the bill’s steep cuts to Medicaid, the health care program for low-income Americans, before voting in favor of the measure.
The White House has maintained that the bill has “no cuts to Medicaid.”
At the Hill Nation Summit on Wednesday, Lieu said Democrats were eager to message around health care in the upcoming midterm elections.
“Our messaging is, if you want to elect the same person who voted for the cuts, you can do that, or you can elect a Democrat that’s going to stop the cuts,” he said.
Hawley has also faced criticism from Democrats for his move to support the massive spending bill and introduce the new measure.
“Just so I’m clear… he’s introducing a bill….to repeal the bill… he voted for….two weeks ago?” Sen. Chris Coons (D-Del.) wrote on X Tuesday.
