“F*** OFF!” NYT Joe Rogan Tucker Carlson “Stolen Election” Situation, Disturbing Medicaid Purge
PDS Published 10/31/2024
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Analysis shows how top podcasts, including Joe Rogan’s, cast doubt on the integrity of the 2024 election, underscoring how podcasting remains uniquely unregulated
Some of the most popular podcasts in America are casting doubt about the integrity of the 2024 election — and with basically no cap.
But experts say this free flow of misinformation could prime listeners not to accept the election and even boost support for Trump and others who want to challenge the outcome if he loses.
And the scope here is not small — we’re not talking about a couple of podcasts.
According to a new analysis by The Washington Post, these doubts about the 2024 election have been aired by more than two dozen popular podcasts.
With some of the most prominent of those 26 programs including “The Joe Rogan Experience” — which, of course, is the single-most popular podcast in America.
As well as other big names like “The Ben Shapiro Show,” “The Charlie Kirk Show” and “The Dan Bongino Show.”
All of which “have amplified unfounded assertions including that the election will be rigged or stolen.”
And that’s incredibly significant because podcasts have had a huge role in this election cycle in a way we have never seen before, with The Post explaining:
“Podcasts are playing an unprecedented role in the campaign, as both Trump and Harris embrace a medium that nearly 100 million Americans listen to weekly.”
Right, in addition to broadcasting false claims in their own time, some of these podcasts have also provided a platform for Trump himself to spew his own lies direct-to-consumer.
With the most notable being his recent appearance on an episode of Joe Rogan Experience, which has racked up more than 40 million views on YouTube.
And there, Trump repeatedly made false claims about the election, going through many of his greatest hits with little pushback from Rogan.
At one point, Rogan even tried to downplay Trump’s election denialism by claiming a lot of Democrats have also denied elections in the past:
JOE ROGAN: One of the things that was fascinating also was the denial of the election results is a pretty common thing. Hillary Clinton famously denied that she called you an illegitimate president and she said that Russia put you in place.
DONALD TRUMP: Even though she conceded?
JOE ROGAN: Yes.
DONALD TRUMP: Even though she conceded the night of the election because she was beaten.
JOE ROGAN: Yes, and it was a thing that was pretty common for people, especially Democrats, to deny the elections. There’s been many of them. The Bush administration, the dangling chads, all that stuff. 1:21:30-1:22:00
JOE ROGAN: My point is, this idea of election fraud is a forbidden topic and you get labeled an election denier. 1:22:23 - 1:22:27
At one point, he also seemed to lead Trump on with a question about election vulnerabilities and fraud but then failed to push back on anything he said.
With Trump going on to ramble about how Elon Musk is concerned about voting machines, saying:
JOE ROGAN: Let’s talk about the potential vulnerabilities for elections and election fraud. One of them is mail-in ballots. The other one is if someone can break into voting machines. If someone can hack voting machines. Those are two huge ones.
DONALD TRUMP: So Elon Musk. Elon Musk. I think he said it publicly. I hope he did because I wouldn’t want to be the winner. He’s a really smart guy. And he’s a very good guy with computers. 2:31:49 - 2:32:14
DONALD TRUMP: He said to me that unless you have paper ballots, it can never be an honest election. That’s a big statement. We should go to paper ballots. 2:32:30 - 2:32:38
DONALD TRUMP: Now we have these sophisticated machines. And it goes all over the place. And down and around. And they say we’ll need two weeks to figure out who the hell won the election.
JOE ROGAN: Do you think that’s by design?
DONALD TRUMP: Yeah, I do. I think it’s very crooked. That’s my opinion. 2:33:04 - 2:33:18
Now, notably here, Rogan did ask Trump a few times if he had evidence for his election fraud claims, but when Trump finally answered, he just kind of accepted his response which was… well… I’ll let you see for yourself:
JOE ROGAN: The 2020 elections. You say you have all this evidence that it was rigged. Why haven’t you put this evidence in a consumable form?
DONALD TRUMP: I did.
JOE ROGAN: In what?
DONALD TRUMP: Oh, I did. I wrote books on it. And by the way, books have been written on it. We have an author named Hemingway who is a great writer. She wrote a book on it. But many books have been written on it. There are books that are. 2:31:07-2:31:30
But, of course, Rogan is just one of these many podcasters who have platformed false election claims.
Right, according to The Post, on 14 of the shows the outlet analyzed, either the host or a guest repeated the Trumpism that his supporters need to overcome an inevitable attempt to steal the election by ensuring that their turnout is “too big to rig.”
What’s more, 19 podcasts also promoted the baseless claims that Democrats are trying to sway the election in their favor by registering noncitizens to vote.
Additionally, other shows have also been echoing some of the false claims Trump used to try and undermine the election.
This including an episode of “The Charlie Kirk Show” just this month.
And there, Kirk asked his guest — Tom Fitton, head of the conservative group Judicial Watch — if he thought the election was fixed.
And Fitton responds by just lying and saying it’s illegal for votes to be counted after Election Day — even though some states literally mandate that practice.
And then claiming that the processes in Arizona and Pennsylvania are structured “to steal the election if need be.”
And the fact that so many shows have been promoting these views to their audiences is absolutely massive.
Because, as The Post explains while podcasts have become a major media tool in this election, the medium “operates largely outside the view of tech industry monitors.”
Thus making podcasts “more vulnerable to disinformation than many other sources.”
Right companies and researchers have limited abilities to study hours of podcasts on major platforms like Spotify and Apple.
And technology that can scan that audio is still in its early stages.
What’s more, tech companies have always struggled with how to manage Trump’s baseless claims, and that’s especially hard for podcast hosting platforms because:
“Unlike content hosted by Facebook or X, podcasts are produced, distributed and monetized by a complicated web of publishers, ad-tech companies and apps, which leaves responsibility for heavily promoted content unclear.”
So, as a result, experts say that because the fast-moving audio format is hard for tech companies and researchers to monitor, it can provide “a safe space” for shows that air election fraud narratives.
And these podcasts are especially powerful when it comes to spreading these lies and conspiracies because hosts foster these very intimate and trusted relationships with their listeners.
With Valerie Wirtschafter (Wert-Shaft-Tur), a fellow at the Brookings Institution, telling The Post:
“These aren’t fringe voices at the end of the day anymore. It’s a really prominent medium that should not be allowed to escape this conversation the way it did in 2020. The microphone is bigger, the audience is larger and the trust is even deeper.”
But policymakers haven’t closely studied the role of podcasts in promoting election fraud narratives.
And while Spotify and Apple do have some policies and community standard in place, they clearly aren’t going far enough.
So for now, we’ll have to wait and see if the space changes, especially after the election.
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This ruling might be a complete game changer for Diddy.
Right, yesterday, a federal judge ruled that a woman suing Sean Combs, aka Diddy, must reveal her name or her case will be tossed out. []
In this suit, the woman is accusing Diddy of threatening her life and raping her back in 2004 when she was just 19 years old. []
And when she filed the suit earlier this month, she did so anonymously, under the “Jane Doe” pseudonym.
Now, this case is one of the first brought against Diddy represented by attorney Tony Buzbee - who has previously said he represents more than 150 victims. []
And has promised to bring over 100 cases against Diddy in the coming months. []
And, in this case, Buzbee and the woman’s other attorneys argued that she should be allowed to stay anonymous because of her fear that Diddy could hurt her. []
But Judge Mary Kay Vyskocil (Vis-ko-sill) wasn’t convinced.
Writing in her opinion yesterday that, according to the woman’s own submissions, DIddy hasn’t contacted her in the 20 years since the alleged rape. []
And he is currently locked up in a Brooklyn jail until the trial for the criminal charges he was arrested for back in September.
The judge went on to say that Diddy has a right to defend himself and investigate the woman accusing him. []
Adding that while there is a real likelihood that this woman is going to face intense public scrutiny if her name is released, that doesn’t outweigh both Diddy’s rights and the rights of the public to know who is using the court system. []
And with that, Vis-ko-sill specifically pointed to the other people who have sued Diddy for similar reasons using their own names. []
So this woman has until November 13th to file the lawsuit under her own name or it’ll be dismissed.
And this ruling could have a serious impact on the other cases being brought against Diddy - specifically, the more than a dozen anonymous ones filed under John of Jane Doe pseudonyms. []
Including the two that were brought against him earlier this week that include allegations he raped a 10 year old boy and a 17 year old contestant on a show he was producing. []
With the attorney in those cases also being Tony Buzbee.
But beyond just the civil cases, there’s also the criminal charges to talk about.
Because Diddy’s attorneys have also reportedly been pushing for federal prosecutors to reveal the identities of his alleged victims. []
With his attorneys saying that they shouldn’t have to, quote,
"play a guessing game—one made all the more challenging by the onslaught of baseless allegations that desperate plaintiffs are lodging at him (for the most part anonymously) in civil suits designed to exact a payoff." []
And that has been Team Diddy’s argument since the beginning - that all of these allegations are bull and he’s an innocent man.
With his attorneys saying in a statement,
"In court, the truth will prevail: that Mr. Combs never sexually assaulted or trafficked anyone -- man or woman, adult or minor.” []
So we’re just going to have to wait and see what comes from this - whether the existing anonymous suits will stay that way, what this means for any new suits filed against Diddy, and finally, what this means for the criminal case.
In the meantime, I would love to know your thoughts about this in those comments down below.
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A dozen arrests, looting, and a bus on fire.
Right, LA Dodgers fans went hard on the celebration after they clinched their 8th World Series title over the Yankees in Game 5 last night. [B Roll 0:00-0:16]
Massive crowds gathered to celebrate and things quickly went from rowdy to destructive.
We’re talking about people vandalizing and breaking into businesses, stealing armfuls of shoes from a Nike store, and even setting a bus on fire.
That’s right, someone set an whole-ass MTA bus on fire in Echo Park. [B Roll 0:15-0:30]
And when the LAPD stepped in, things didn’t get much better - especially as fans took hours to clear the street following a dispersal order. [B Roll 0:00-0:30]
According to the LAPD’s spokesperson, there were street takeovers in several places and police used less-lethal munitions to try and control the hostile and violent crowds. []
Reportedly 12 people were arrested on charges like failure to disperse, receiving stolen property, and commercial burglary
Many online actually heavily criticized the police response to the celebrations - like on person who said over a video of the burning bus,
“The LAPD are to blame for this. They were out in their riot gear minutes after the game was over yelling at people to go home. Bitch we are home.” []
And others called upon Mayor Karen Bass to just let people celebrate and, quote, “Call off the goons.”
But it wasn’t all insanity - many celebrations happened all over the city without incident.
Fireworks and chanting, people banging pots and pans together from their porches, and just overall merriment. []
In fact, in Little Tokyo, a crowd gathered around a mural of Shohei Ohtani (sho-hay oh-tah-knee) - the Dodgers player who became the first to ever hit 50 home runs and steal 50 bases in a single season.
Even the Hollywood sign partook in the excitement - with just the D lighting up blue.
As for what the celebrations will look like from here, Bass put out a statement saying that the LAPD will be on high alert this week to protect communities and businesses.
Adding that as the celebration continues, quote, “... violence will not be tolerated.”
So we’re going to have to keep our eyes on this in the coming days.
But I would love to know your thoughts - especially if you’re a Dodgers fan or live out in LA.
Let me know in those comments down below.
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South American crew accused of using signal jammers and disguises to break into banks and ATMs and steal millions across California according to Feds
Federal prosecutors claim that a crew of South American bank robbers made off with $2.5 million after hitting multiple Californian banks and are now charging 10 in connection with the heists.
[]According to the FBI, the crew apparently was helped a lot by just acting like they were supposed to be there.
Right, they wore construction vests and hats, alongside surgical masks to hide their identities, in order to scout out banks when planning their heists.
This allowed them to target banks more like you’d see in Oceans 11 rather than Heat.
Right, like during scouting missions they would spray paint camera lenses and scout out bank floor plans.
For example, In May they got access to an ATM vault in Fresno and $80,000 by drilling through the wall of a unit that was next to the bank.
[]That was only possible because they were able to successfully scout the place.
And the whole “get into a neighboring business to rob a bank” was considered a signature of theirs.
Like their last heist was probably in mid-September, when they stole $247,000 from a Wells Fargo in Fresno (again) by breaking into the pet spa next door.
[]
On top of that, they also used signal jammers to prevent wireless security devices from working.
However, things started to unravel back in May when the FBI started following the case.
They quickly linked the group's tactics to several robberies across California.
The FBI noticed that during the robberies there were always three cars present: a silver Suburban, a silver Audi SUV, and a white Ford Explorer.
[]A huge break came in September when the Chevy was pulled over in Simi Valley.
Ends up the car was reported stolen by Hertz rental, although the driver claims to have been unaware of that and said he has just rented the car from a club promoter.
(Who the fuck rents cars as a side hustle?)
The FBI then tracked this person down and interviewed him and learned he had also loaned the car out to a man named “Gordito.”
And that’s when the house of cards came crashing down.
Because the Chevy also had an Apple Airtag device in it, allowing the FBI to track all of its movements and connect it to Airbnb rentals in every city that had a bank robbery as well as see that it was always near the robberies.
So they went after Gordito, later found to be Alex Moyano Morales, a Chilean national who allegedly led this group.
On that note, the group was apparently made of mostly Chileans, as well as at least one who ultimately came from Venezuela.
[](This isn’t noted in articles, but the Chilean community across the US is NOT happy about this. Chile is the only LATAM country with Visa-free travel to the US. This is also not the first time a Chilean-linked robbery group made headlines, so all added together there’s a fear that headlines like this could ruin that perk. Source: am a Chilean who has yet to rob a home/bank).
[]
Either way, it ends up that Moyano was linked to crimes both in California and Chile and was finally picked up in Glendale.
He had been using aliases to avoid capture for quite some time.
The rest of the crew was still out though and it wasn’t until October 18th that they were tracked down in Oregon and Seattle.
[]Right, one group had set up shop in an Oregon Airbnb before becoming suspicious that police were on their tails.[]
So they tried to get out in a hurry -- I mean like even abandoning tools -- but the police still got them.
Another group had set up shop in Seattle on that same day before getting nabbed.
[]Obviously it’ll likely be a while before we get an official verdict, but considering the mountain of evidence against this crew it’s hard to imagine anything but serious prison time.
Also, looking back I can’t imagine this was worth it.
Right, they took $2.5 million total and there were 10 of them.
That’s like $250,000 each for YEARS behind bars.
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Android malware that can intercept calls to banks and reroute them to hackers just got even harder to detect
Security experts always warn that if you’re ever unsure about a call from your bank, just use the number directly on your credit card.
But what if even that number was compromised?
That’s kinda what a group of hackers have been able to do with an app called “FakeCall,” according to security experts Zimperium.
On top of that, it also puts up a fake image on the screen to still show the bank number so users THINK they’re still on a call with the bank.
It’s based on a similar tech that was discovered in 2022, although the exact method has obviously changed since then.
In particular, it starts with a phishing attack.
[]Users then download an .apk -- which is the format Android apps come in -- and are now pretty screwed unless they uninstall the app.
From there the app asks to be set as the default calling app.
And let’s be honest: most people just go “okay, okay, okay, okay” to nearly every prompt when installing an app.
[]
But by becoming the default calling app it gives the malw are a ton of access to the phone and abuses its accessibility features to redirect the calls.
That might just be the start of it too.
According to researchers the malware might actually be far more powerful than that and can fully hijack your phone, not just calls.
Right, things like giving other apps more permissions than they should have and monitoring bluetooth and screen activity.
[]Also, to be clear the name of the app may not always be “fake call,” right they can change it to whatever they want.
All of this actually highlights something Apple has argued in their antitrust court case.
That their closed-off app store ecosystem lets them prevent hacks like this.
[]Which is partially true, as these kinds of vulnerabilities are far, far less common on iOS.
All that being said, the normal anti-hack advice still remains the same:
Don’t download shit from emails or click random links.
And be hyper vigilant of even the most normal-looking emails, because all it takes is one slip up to be fucked.
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Texas Denying Healthcare to Children Solo
Texas is denying children access to lifesaving procedures, critical care, and other essential health services.
Right, specifically, the state is doing this by mass-purging millions of people from their Medicaid rolls, causing many people to lose coverage — even when they’re still eligible.
But because of the sheer number of people who have wrongfully lost coverage and are trying to get it back, Texas’ Medicaid offices have become totally overwhelmed.
Meaning that people who improperly lost their insurance have to go without coverage for longer periods, sometimes waiting months at a time.
And all the while, the state’s medical system is being strained by the large population of newly uninsured.
But a new investigation by ProPublica and The Texas Tribune found that all of this was totally preventable.
Right, for some background here, during the pandemic, the federal government paid states BILLIONS of dollars to not kick people off Medicaid and make the health crisis that much worse.
So, as a result, Medicaid rolls grew astronomically nationwide.
Just in Texas alone, the number of people receiving those benefits increased by more than 50% to 6 million.
But in April of 2023, the federal government stopped requiring states to keep everyone enrolled, leaving them to determine who was still eligible and who needed to be removed.
A process that is commonly known as Medicaid unwinding.
And from the get-go, federal officials were worried about how the unwinding would impact vulnerable Americans, like the millions of low-income people who rely on Medicaid for healthcare.
So, in order to prevent poor families from losing coverage, the federal Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services — CMS — issued guidelines instructing states to move slowly and carefully.
But Texas did the exact opposite, working to remove as many people as possible as fast as possible.
And those efforts were unprecedented — right, according to the non-profit health organization KFF, Texas purged more residents from Medicaid than ANY OTHER state, with officials disenrolling a whopping 2.5 million people in total.
And yes, Texas is the second-biggest state in the country, but it still removed MORE people than it kept on the rolls.
But — and this is the key thing here — the VAST majority of those people weren’t removed because they were no longer eligible for Medicaid.
As KFF found, nearly 7 out of every 10 Texans stripped of their insurance were disenrolled for administrative and bureaucratic reasons, like failing to return a renewal form or filling one out incorrectly.
Or because of issues on the administrator's end, like when a state Medicaid office doesn’t have up-to-date contact information and can’t reach people to tell them they need to resubmit their qualifying documents.
Right, and that kind of procedural shit happens all the time, but when you’re talking about it happening to 1.7 MILLION people, you have to wonder if there’s a bigger failure with how the system is being administered.
And that is exactly what ProPublica found in its investigation, with the outlet reporting that it viewed dozens of public and private records which “clearly” show:
“that those and other mistakes were preventable and foreshadowed in persistent warnings from the federal government, whistleblowers and advocates.” x
Right, from the very start, Texas decided to go against multiple key federal guidelines.
For example, federal officials encouraged states not to review more than 11% of their caseloads each month, arguing that doing any more could overwhelm their Medicaid systems and cause eligible people to be removed.
But just in the first month of the unwinding, Texas reviewed nearly a MILLION cases — 17% of its caseload.
And within 6 months, the state had launched reviews of around 4.6 million cases.
But arguably the most significant federal guidance Texas ignored was the strong recommendation that states automatically renew eligible residents using existing government data.
Right, using information like tax records or quarterly payroll data employers report to determine how much money a family makes and if they qualify.
But instead, Texas forced nearly EVERYONE to resubmit documents to prove they still were still eligible for Medicaid.
Which is a big part of the reason so many people were removed for administrative reasons like failing to provide the necessary documents in time.
But Texas didn’t just flout guidance — it repeatedly ignored NUMEROUS direct warnings from the federal government.
According to ProPublica, just one month into the unwinding, the federal government pressed Texas on why it was moving so fast, and officials responded by downplaying the concerns.
Then, a few months later, in July, U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary Xavier Becerra (Zay-vyer Beh-Sarah) urged Texas and other states to automatically renew more people using existing government data.
And that same week, a group of employees anonymously emailed the leader of the Texas Health and Human Services Commission —
Claiming senior management had informed them that tens of thousands of people had been improperly removed from Medicaid thanks to the agency’s poor handling of the unwinding.
But it doesn’t end there — in August, CMS explicitly asked Texas to stop requiring eligible people to resubmit documents proving they still qualified.
Noting that it appeared that many people weren’t even aware that they had to re-enroll, couldn’t understand the forms, or faced other issues.
And around the same time, numerous advocacy groups, health providers, and newspaper editorial boards began urging the state to pause its harmful unwinding and make sure that people weren’t incorrectly losing their insurance.
But Texas just kept ignoring and ignoring, and the problems persisted.
With things getting so bad that, back in December, Beh-Sarah appealed directly to Texas Gov. Greg Abbott and 8 other governors of states with the highest shares of children who had lost Medicaid coverage.
With Beh-Sarah writing that Texas ALONE accounted for nearly a QUARTER of ALL American kids who lost federal insurance during the unwinding.
And once again urging the state to follow federal guidelines.
But Texas, like the others before it, ignored that final plea, with ProPublica writing:
“The decision to buck federal government guidelines was one of many that led to serious repercussions for Texas residents who rely on the program.”
And, as the outlet notes, that decision was especially devastating because the state already has so many restrictions on Medicaid that make access so much harder.
Right, Texas provides Medicaid to a smaller percentage of its residents than almost ANY other state.
What's more, it’s also one of 10 states that never expanded eligibility after the passage of Obamacare.
And that thanks in part to Greg Abbott, who helped successfully sue the federal government to make sure states didn’t have to cover more residents when he was the state attorney general.
So, as a result, the state’s program is seriously limited and mostly only applies to children, pregnant people, and disabled adults.
But poor adults usually aren’t eligible unless they have kids, and even then, the threshold is super low — parents who have 2 kids only qualify when they have a combined income of under $285 a month.
But oftentimes, kids can still qualify even if their parents don’t, which is why when the state mass-purged its Medicaid rolls, most of the eligible people it hurt were children.
And the impacts of that are insanely consequential, with one pediatrician telling ProPublica that children have been forced to postpone or even totally forgo lifesaving operations like heart surgeries.
And critical care has also been unnecessarily cut for kids with severe diseases like sickle cell anemia, as well as those with autism or other developmental disorders.
And while crucial care is obviously the most serious repercussion, any lapse in health care coverage also hurts families who just need regular, everyday care.
Which is exactly what happened to Micaela (Mik-Kayla) Hoops — right, her kids had been on Medicaid all their lives but lost their coverage during the unwinding.
And after years of never having to renew their coverage, Hoops was confused when she was required to reapply and missed the deadline.
So Hoops was forced to frantically apply 7 days after the coverage lapsed.
But because the Medicaid system was so bogged down with all the people who had wrongly lost coverage re-applying, it took over 100 days for their insurance to be restored.
And in those 100-plus days that the family went without insurance, Hoops had to take her oldest son to the emergency room for a serious migraine — a visit that cost $3,000 she and her husband couldn’t pay.
Then, a few months later, the 14-year-old broke his nose, and while she paid a few hundred dollars out of pocket for the doctor, she couldn’t afford the CT scan needed to reset his nose, which was just left to heal crooked.
And while Hoops’ family eventually got their healthcare back, there are many other people who went through the same thing, being forced to reapply and wait long periods of time without insurance.
Right, according to the state Medicaid agency, the median processing time for applications is nearly three months because of the strain caused by the mass purges.
But that’s WAY more than the federal limit, which is 45 days in most cases.
In fact, the wait time situation is so serious that CMS launched an investigation into it back in May.
But the consequences of Texas’ decision also go beyond the human element, with ProPublica explaining:
“The sudden suspension of health insurance for a population the size of New Mexico has had additional ramifications in Texas, including higher treatment costs for hospitals and clinics forced to take on more uninsured patients.”
Right, Texas Children’s Hospital in Houston — the single biggest pediatric hospital in the country —- had to lay off employees because of major budget shortfalls caused in part by the loss of Medicaid patients during the unwinding.
And statewide, some safety net clinics reported a 30% decrease in Medicaid revenue, forcing layoffs, furloughs, and cuts to certain health services.
And in case you thought things couldn’t get shittier, just wait for this one.
Texas uses the same eligibility system to process applications for both Medicaid and food stamps.
So some families who were pushed off their healthcare ALSO lost their food benefits and are having to wait over a month for that assistance.
So obviously, this is a huge fucking mess, and as far as what happens from here, unfortunately, there’s not much that can be done to help all the people and healthcare systems that Texas has hurt.
At least right now, the only glimmer of hope for accountability is the federal probe into the long wait times.
And while federal officials and health policy experts say it’s a solid step, there are very few options for CMS to actually hold Texas responsible.
Right, experts say the agency could pull federal funding, but that could result in low-income people losing health insurance and open the government up for a lawsuit.
What’s more, the probe probably won’t go anywhere if Trump wins in November because he’s encouraged states to restrict Medicaid and vowed to repeal Obamacare.
So for now, we’ll just have to keep an eye on this, and in the meantime, I’d love to know your thoughts here — especially if you live in Texas.