'Healthcare Cuts Will Kill' Rally Protests Deadly Trump-GOP War on Medicaid

Advocates, vulnerable Americans, and progressive members of Congress rallied outside the U.S. Capitol on Wednesday to denounce and continue building public opposition to congressional Republicans' proposed cuts to Medicaid and other key healthcare programs, which would have devastating consequences nationwide.

The "Healthcare Cuts Will Kill" rally featured remarks from a home health aide who warned that the unparalleled Medicaid cuts included in the GOP legislation would endanger the wellbeing of seniors who rely on the program's coverage to survive.

"They need home attendants for support with daily living," said Miriam, a member of Make the Road NY, in her remarks at the rally. "Stripping them and mothers like me of Medicaid would be devastating."

Advocates who attended the demonstration later made their way into the U.S. Capitol Building, where they planned to hold office visits with lawmakers to discuss their grave concerns about the GOP attacks on healthcare.

The actions came as Republicans continued work on a sprawling reconciliation bill that would cut Medicaid by more than $700 billion over the next decade, kick nearly 11 million people off their healthcare, and potentially cause more than 51,000 excess deaths per year.

The legislation would also trigger over $500 billion in automatic cuts to Medicare, according to the Congressional Budget Office.

In a letter to their Senate colleagues earlier this week, a faction of far-right House Republicans argued that the GOP legislation needs to "go much further on spending reductions," including cuts to Medicaid.

"If Trump's 'Big, Beautiful Betrayal' wasn't devastating enough to Americans' bottom line, the House Freedom Caucus is calling on their Senate colleagues to go further, risking even more Americans' healthcare," Tony Carrk, executive director of Accountable.US, said in response to the letter. "Point blank: Americans shouldn’t lose their healthcare to pay for billionaire tax cuts."

Speaking at Wednesday's rally, Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) said Republican lawmakers are "going to war against low-income and middle-class people" to fund another round of debt-exploding tax breaks for the ultra-wealthy.

"We are the only country not to guarantee healthcare to all, the healthcare system is broken, they want to make it even worse," said the Vermont senator.

Analilia Mejia, co-director of Popular Democracy in Action, one of the groups that organized the rally, said that "it's easy for many Americans to imagine that they are not going to be impacted by this large, unscrupulous, unconscionable transfer of wealth, by this ridiculous notion that, because we all die, some of us, depending on our bank account, will die earlier without care or concern."

"Every single one of us are going to be impacted because we will be in a society where the 'haves' have many and have much, and the 'have-nots' are denied food, healthcare, and education," said Mejia. "And that's a society none of us want to live in."

"Senate Republicans are charging forward with attacks on our healthcare, ripping coverage away from millions of Americans and raising costs for millions more."

Ahead of the rally, Sanders and 10 Democratic senators demanded that the Republican chair of the Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee schedule hearings on the GOP reconciliation bill's proposed healthcare cuts, warning that they would "create a national healthcare emergency" if enacted.

"Not only would millions of Americans lose their health insurance and tens of thousands of our constituents die as a result of the House-passed reconciliation bill, the cost of prescription drugs would go up for seniors, hospitals and community health centers in rural and underserved areas would close or shut down access to services that patients rely on, and nursing homes would be made less safe," the senators wrote.

"Failure to hold hearings and a markup on this reconciliation bill before it is considered on the Senate floor," they added, "would be an abdication of our duty to the American people."

Anthony Wright of Families USA, which helped organize the Capitol Hill demonstrations, said in a statement Wednesday that new legislative text released by Senate Republicans "doubles down on the disastrous bill passed by House Republicans."

"The text out today would raise health insurance premiums for 10 million people by as much as $1,400 a year," said Wright. "As we await additional bill text from the Senate, these provisions serve as a glaring red flag that Senate Republicans are charging forward with attacks on our healthcare, ripping coverage away from millions of Americans and raising costs for millions more."