JD Vance's shutdown bet: MAGA loves racism more than health care

[marmar]

JD Vance’s shutdown bet: MAGA loves racism more than health care
The vice president's argument assumes it’s better for millions to lose coverage than for one immigrant to gain it

By Amanda Marcotte
Senior Writer
Published October 3, 2025 6:45AM (EDT)


(Salon) To hear Vice President JD Vance talk, you’d think the only people who ever see a doctor in the U.S. are undocumented immigrants. He insists that Democrats are refusing to support a Republican budget bill because “they want to give hundreds of billions of dollars of health care benefits to illegal aliens.” As Vance repeats the lie, the number gets bigger. He’s even claimed that it’s a “trillion dollars for medical benefits for illegal aliens.” By the time you read this, Vance might even be saying that Democrats plan to ban all citizens from ever entering a hospital again. After all, if you’re going to shamelessly lie, why not just go buck wild?

And make no mistake: This is a lie. As he usually does, the vice president traps the press into playing his game by saying something flatly, outrageously untrue. Then, when he is called on it, Vance pretends he actually meant [fill in with a much smaller claim]. He did this during the campaign after being called out for his overt lie about Haitian immigrants kidnapping and eating people’s pets. The lie, he insisted, was fair play — because the part where there are Haitian immigrants living in the U.S. is true. Using this logic, I could almost write “JD Vance kills and eats babies,” and when — justifiably — challenged about it, I could insist it’s not a lie because he kisses babies with his mouth.

....(snip)....

Vance lies — and he does it well. It’s why he was brought on as Donald Trump‘s second in command. But what may be even more important is the assumption driving this particular falsehood, which is to lure people into a “debate” about whether any immigrants should ever get health care. Vance is betting that the typical Trump voter would rather lose his own health insurance than see a dark-skinned immigrant receive medical treatment.

When you dig into it, this strategy presents itself as especially vile, because it depends on the MAGA base being so racist that they would choose bankruptcy, or even death, over having to share a doctor’s waiting room with people speaking Spanish. ..............(more)

https://www.salon.com/2025/10/03/jd-vances-shutdown-bet-maga-loves-racism-more-than-health-care/