Did Joe Biden Overstate Democratic Voters' Opposition To 'Medicare For All'?
“The fact is that right now the vast majority of
Former Vice President
This story also ran on PolitiFact. This story can be republished for free (details).
When the subject of “Medicare for All” came up during the Democratic debate last week, former Vice President
“The fact is that right now the vast majority of
This seemed to be a very strong statement, and we weren’t sure that voters’ positions on this issue were as clear-cut as Biden made them out to be, so we asked his campaign where he got the information.
Public Opinion
The Biden campaign initially directed us to news coverage of a
On the flip side, though, when — in the same poll — Medicare for All was described as guaranteeing health insurance as a right for all Americans, or that it would eliminate health insurance premiums and reduce out-of-pocket costs, the majority favored the national health plan.
That poll, now nearly a year old, found that when simply asked, 56% said they did favor having “a national health plan, sometimes called Medicare-for-all, where all Americans would get their insurance from a single government plan.”
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Those percentages, though, reflected the views of all Americans, not just
The KFF Health Tracking Poll, done monthly, indicates Democrats’ support for Medicare for All has weakened, but not entirely. Its most recent version, published in November, revealed large majorities of
“The majority of
Other polls show similar results: support for Medicare for All among
A
“The data … does show majority support among Democratic voters (whether that reaches a “vast majority” depends upon your interpretation), but higher support for a public option,”Jeff Horwitt, senior vice president with
The Biden campaign also directed us to a September KFF Health Tracking Poll that showed that 55% of
And one more from the Biden campaign — a
That same
The numbers from these various polls seem to communicate a range of opinions among
Rather than asking survey respondents if they favored Medicare for All, the survey asked them to choose among Medicare for All, improving the existing ACA or replacing the ACA with state health plans.
For registered
But Blendon noted that survey respondents often will say yes to a “one-off question” about whether they support something and that answer can change once they have to choose among options, such as in his organization’s survey.
“The answer is that
Congressional Support And Another Context
Sources:
Email exchange with
KFF, “Health Tracking Poll —
KFF, “Health Tracking Poll —
Telephone interview with
Email interview with
KFF, “Health Tracking Poll —
SSRS, “CNN Politics Democrats and Health Care
Telephone interview with
S. 1129 – “Medicare for All Act of 2019,” sponsored by Sen.
H.R. 1384 – “Medicare for All Act of 2019,” sponsored by Rep.
Horwitt also made the point that it wasn’t clear in Biden’s statement which group of people he was referencing.
“I recall hearing the statement in real-time, but in looking now at just the statement from Biden below, it is unclear to me if he is talking about elected
While the Biden campaign did direct us to public opinion polls, they also pointed out that the
The Senate Medicare for All bill, introduced by Sen.
Our Ruling
During the recent presidential primary debates, Biden said: “The fact is that right now the vast majority of
However, when those same polls dig deeper into this support by asking about the favorability of other Democratic-favored health policies — Medicare for All, the public option or expansions of the Affordable Care Act — or if such a Medicare for All program should replace private insurance, this support becomes weaker. The polls do seem to suggest support among
For these reasons, we rate this statement Mostly False.
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