Harris blasts Trump’s ‘concepts of a plan’ for health care in run-up to VP debate

One day before Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz (D) and Sen. JD Vance (R-Ohio) face off in the vice presidential debate, the Harris-Walz campaign has released a more than 40-page report attacking the Trump-Vance health care plan, which the Democratic ticket says will “eliminate health insurance and raise costs for tens of millions of Americans.” 

“After nearly a decade of endlessly promising to reveal his health care plan, Donald Trump claims he only has ‘concepts of a plan.’ The truth is he does have a plan—he just doesn’t want voters to know about it,” the Harris-Walz campaign writes in the report.  

During the presidential debate between Vice President Harris and former President Trump, moderators pushed the Republican candidate on his health care plans, and he responded that he “had concepts of a plan.” 

“His plan adds up to this: eliminating health insurance and raising costs for tens of millions of Americans, including those with preexisting conditions, seniors, small business owners, working families, pregnant women, and kids,” the report adds.

The Trump campaign pushed back against the report, saying Harris wants to “bankrupt the country” with her health care plans. 

“Kamala Harris wants to bankrupt the country with free healthcare for 11 million illegal immigrants, which is part of her $32 trillion government-run healthcare plan to eliminate private health insurance,” Trump national press secretary Karoline Leavitt told The Hill. “When President Trump is re-elected, he will protect Americans from unaffordable drug prices while making sure that seniors are protected from the massive Medicare premium increases resulting from the Harris Inflation Reduction Act.”

According to a Harris campaign official, the report is being unveiled before the vice presidential debate in part because “Vance has been the cheerleader for the Trump-Vance health care plan.” 

During an interview last week, Vance told NBC’s “Meet the Press” that Trump’s health care plan would “promote choice” by separating sicker people into different health insurance coverage pools. This would revive a proposal made by Republicans in 2017 during their effort to repeal the Affordable Care Act (ACA). 

“Just recently, Vance said that if he and Trump are in office, they’ll let insurance companies kick high-risk individuals—the sickest and most vulnerable Americans—out of affordable health plans, and instead divert them into insurance pools all on their own—a move that will raise costs for the people least able to cover them,” the campaign wrote in the report. 

The ACA prevented health insurance companies from precluding people with preexisting conditions from having health insurance and also prevented insurance companies from charging them higher premiums.

According to KFF, more than 50 million Americans, or 27 percent of the nation’s population, had a preexisting condition — including asthma, high blood pressure, cancer, diabetes or arthritis — that allowed for health insurance companies to turn them away before the enactment of the ACA.

Per the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, anywhere from 50 million to 129 million Americans might have a preexisting condition today. 

The campaign report also lays out the four “concepts” of the Trump-Vance health care plan, which it claims is “aligned with Project 2025.” 

The four prongs include a plan to “rip health insurance away from millions,” “raise the costs of prescription drugs and health insurance,” “cut Medicare and slash Medicaid” and “ban abortion nationwide.” 

The Trump campaign pushed back, saying Trump will ensure “that Americans get quality medicines at the best price,” “eliminate waste, fraud, and abuse throughout the health care system” and “strengthen Medicare.”

In campaign speeches and interviews, both Trump and Vance have discussed repealing portions or all of the ACA. 

The Harris-Walz report cites a March Trump interview with CNBC’s Joe Kernen in which he called for cuts to Medicare and Medicaid. However, in the interview, he referred to “theft and the bad management of entitlements.” 

The Harris campaign insists Trump has “sought to hide his record by claiming that his plans to cut Medicare are just aimed at addressing efficiency.”

They also cite the Center for Budget and Policy Priorities analysis of Trump’s budget while in office, saying the analysis showed Trump’s effort to slash Medicare and Medicaid. 

The report also tied Trump to Project 2025 and House Republican plans to cut Medicare and Medicaid, which the Georgetown Center for Children and Families has predicted could halve Medicaid spending. 

However, Trump has attempted to distance himself from Project 2025 throughout the presidential campaign. 

Trump has also said he will not ban abortion nationwide, saying that after the overturning of Roe v. Wade, the decision is back at the state level “where it should be.” 

However, when moderators at the presidential debate asked him if he would veto a nationwide abortion ban, he did not answer the question. When moderators asked him why Vance had said in August that Trump would veto such a ban, Trump distanced himself from Vance’s comments, saying the vice presidential pick “was not speaking for me.” 

The report also attacked Trump’s health care plan for seniors, saying it would raise the health care prices for more than 60 million seniors. 

The campaign cited an analysis by the AARP that found Republican plans similar to Trump’s health care policies could lead to a “$4,124 age tax” for seniors by eliminating a cap within ObamaCare that prevented insurance companies from charging seniors more than triple the premiums of younger people.

In the report, the Harris campaign also focused on the impacts of the Trump health care plan on communities of color, saying Trump’s plans could increase the percentage of Hispanic Americans without coverage by 40 percent and the number of Black households without coverage by 85 percent. 

According to a spokesperson for the Harris campaign, Trump’s health care plans will threaten the health insurance of at least 1 million people in the Asian American, Native Hawaiian, and Pacific Islander communities.

Updated at 9:17 a.m. EDT