Tom Carper: Medicaid Is for Our Parents, Grandparents, Aunts, Uncles, Veterans

CHUCK TODD: We’re talking around Medicaid here. I want to sort of close out the conversation this way. Is Medicaid going to be essentially the default insurance option for folks that can’t get any other insurance at this point?

Like, is this default in rural America at that point?

SEN. TOM CARPER: Let me answer that question this way. When I was 29 years old, right out of the Navy, I got to be state treasurer. Got elected ‘cause nobody wanted to run. And when I was state treasurer I thought Medicaid was health care for poor women with children.

CHUCK TODD: That was what everybody I think —

SEN. TOM CARPER: It was.

CHUCK TODD: That was the stereotype of what it is.

SEN. TOM CARPER: Well, it’s not today. Almost two thirds of the money we spend in Medicaid is for our parents, or grandparents, and our aunts and our uncles. A lot of them are poor. A lot of them have dementia. Two million of them are veterans. And for us to walk away from that, I think, obligation to veterans and older people, I don’t think we want to do that. Are there ways to provide care through Medicaid in more cost effective ways? Yes, we do. In many states we have private insurance who run managed care plans in order to hold down costs.