{"id":2677862,"date":"2026-10-07T09:25:54","date_gmt":"2026-10-07T13:25:54","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/utm_sourcerssutm_mediumrssutm_campaigntrumps-90-medicare-checks-will-undermine-the-program-they-claim-to-protect\/"},"modified":"2026-10-07T09:31:30","modified_gmt":"2026-10-07T13:31:30","slug":"utm_sourcerssutm_mediumrssutm_campaigntrumps-90-medicare-checks-will-undermine-the-program-they-claim-to-protect","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/utm_sourcerssutm_mediumrssutm_campaigntrumps-90-medicare-checks-will-undermine-the-program-they-claim-to-protect\/","title":{"rendered":"Trump&#8217;s $90 Medicare Checks Will Undermine The Program They Claim To Protect"},"content":{"rendered":"<aside class=\"mashsb-container mashsb-main mashsb-stretched\"><div class=\"mashsb-box\"><div class=\"mashsb-count mash-medium\" style=\"&quot;\"><div class=\"counts mashsbcount\">24<\/div><span class=\"mashsb-sharetext\">SHARES<\/span><\/div><div class=\"mashsb-buttons\"><a class=\"mashicon-facebook mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/sharer.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.conservativenewsdaily.net%2Fbreaking-news%2Futm_sourcerssutm_mediumrssutm_campaigntrumps-90-medicare-checks-will-undermine-the-program-they-claim-to-protect%2F\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Facebook<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-twitter mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/intent\/tweet?text=&amp;url=https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=2677862&amp;via=ConservNewsDly\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Twitter<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-subscribe mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"#\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Subscribe<\/span><\/a><div class=\"onoffswitch2 mash-medium mashsb-noshadow\" style=\"display:none\"><\/div><\/div>\n            <\/div>\n                <div style=\"clear:both\"><\/div><\/aside>\n            <!-- Share buttons by mashshare.net - Version: 4.0.47--><p>The article critiques President Trump\u2019s decision to issue Medicare rebates to seniors,arguing that it is poor policy. Unlike Obamacare rebates, which refunded enrollees\u2019 own payments, the Medicare rebates are funded by taxpayer dollars, effectively transferring wealth from younger generations to seniors. The rebates come from the Medicare Improvement Fund (MIF),a &#8220;slush fund&#8221; created in 2008 to park budgetary savings from healthcare legislation-an arrangement used to finance future health spending by Congress. Historically, no management has spent money from the MIF, but recent actions have changed this practice.<\/p>\n<p>The article contends that using $2 billion from the MIF to grant these rebates lacks policy coherence, as the fund\u2019s purpose is to improve the Medicare fee-for-service program, not to <a href=\"https:\/\/amzn.to\/3YuVZYV\" >make political cash giveaways shortly<\/a> before elections. Most seniors enrolled in Medicare Advantage or with means-tested premiums are ineligible for these payments, making the rebates more symbolic than substantive. Moreover, funding these rebates from Medicare&#8217;s existing resources worsens the program\u2019s already dire financial outlook, as Medicare faces imminent insolvency. Ultimately, the author argues that rather of obscuring the program\u2019s need for fiscal reform, lawmakers should focus on reducing spending to bolster Medicare\u2019s long-term viability.  <\/p>\n<p class=\"readmore\">\n    <button onclick=\"showReadMore()\" id=\"readmorebtn\">Read more&#8230;<\/button>\n<\/p>\n<hr id=\"line\">\n<span id=\"more\"><\/p>\n<div>\n<p>A few weeks ago, I <a href=\"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/2026\/09\/17\/trump-admin-to-pay-americans-back-for-bidens-obamacare-overcharges\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">wrote<\/a> about how President Trump\u2019s decision to send rebates to some Obamacare customers represented sound policy. His more recent announcement about Medicare rebates to seniors, not so much.<\/p>\n<p>While the Obamacare rebates represented a refund of user fees that the Obamacare enrollees themselves had paid, the Medicare rebates instead comprise general taxpayer dollars \u2014 in other words, a shift of cash from the young to seniors. More importantly, Medicare faces <a href=\"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/2022\/06\/10\/fact-check-medicare-is-already-functionally-insolvent\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">major financing challenges<\/a> in the next few years, such that spending \u2014 as opposed to saving \u2014 more cash on the program will further undermine its solvency.<\/p>\n<h2><strong>Explaining the \u2018Slush Fund<\/strong>\u2018<\/h2>\n<p>In a <a href=\"https:\/\/truthsocial.com\/@realDonaldTrump\/posts\/117374727722154598\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">social media post<\/a> announcing the move, the president said the checks of <a href=\"https:\/\/www.cms.gov\/newsroom\/fact-sheets\/medicare-improvement-fund-premium-rebate-frequently-asked-questions\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">$90 each<\/a>, paid out to about 21 million seniors, would \u201ccome from the Medicare Improvement Fund (MIF), a pointless \u2018Slush Fund.\u2019\u201d That oversimplifies matters slightly, as the MIF represents a cross between a \u201cslush fund\u201d and a checking account.<\/p>\n<p>Congress <a href=\"https:\/\/www.cbo.gov\/publication\/59115\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">created the fund in 2008<\/a>, and since then has used it to \u201cpark\u201d budgetary savings from <a href=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/new-spending-deal-hinges-on-sen-sinema\/\" title=\"New Spending Deal Hinges on Sen. Sinema\">health care legislation<\/a>. Practically every year \u2014 more often, several times a year \u2014 Congress passes measures extending various mandatory health spending programs, ranging from changes to Medicare physician payments (aka the \u201cdoc fix\u201d) to spending on <a href=\"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/2023\/09\/12\/house-gop-adopts-bernie-sanders-plan-to-extend-obamacares-mandatory-spending\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">community health centers<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>In most cases, lawmakers reduce spending elsewhere to pay for the new disbursements. But the sums don\u2019t always align precisely. To use a hypothetical example, assume Congress wants to pass a \u201cdoc fix\u201d that would cost $5 billion, but the policies used to pay for this new spending would generate $6 billion in savings.<\/p>\n<p>That\u2019s where the MIF comes in. Congress would \u201cpark\u201d the additional $1 billion in savings (i.e., $6 billion in savings minus $5 billion in \u201cdoc fix\u201d spending) in the fund, which it could then use to help finance the next \u201cdoc fix,\u201d or some other health care spending provision that lawmakers want to fund in the future.<\/p>\n<p>Essentially, the MIF smooths out the effects of Congressional Budget Office (CBO) scorekeeping on health care legislation, or at least Congress has used it that way for nearly the past two decades. (A separate Medicaid Improvement Fund, also established in 2008, serves a similar purpose for that program.) As a CBO <a href=\"https:\/\/www.cbo.gov\/publication\/59115\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">report<\/a> from 2023 noted, Congress has made frequent use of the mechanism over the past decade-plus. As the president noted, the biggest transfer out of the MIF was over $20 billion as part of Obamacare \u2014j ust part of the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.washingtonpost.com\/news\/wonk\/wp\/2012\/08\/14\/romneys-right-obamacare-cuts-medicare-by-716-billion-heres-how\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">raid on Medicare<\/a> used to fund that new entitlement.<\/p>\n<p>Up until this point, no administration had actually <a href=\"https:\/\/www.cbo.gov\/publication\/59115\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">spent money<\/a> out of the MIF, likely because of the unspoken but shared assumption between Congress and presidents that the money was a short-term place to \u201cpark\u201d savings. But the Trump Administration obviously did not consider itself a party to this tacit agreement. And when just over $2 billion in MIF funds became <a href=\"https:\/\/www.law.cornell.edu\/uscode\/text\/42\/1395iii\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">available for disbursement<\/a> last Thursday (i.e., October 1, the beginning of Fiscal Year 2027), the president announced his rebate gambit.<\/p>\n<h2><strong>Misguided Policy<\/strong><\/h2>\n<p>On many different levels, using $2 billion from the MIF to send payments to seniors doesn\u2019t make much policy or political sense. For starters, the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.law.cornell.edu\/uscode\/text\/42\/1395iii\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">text of the law<\/a> specifies that the fund should \u201cmake improvements under the original Medicare fee-for-service program under parts A and B \u2026 including adjustments to payments for items and services furnished by providers of services and suppliers under such original Medicare fee-for-service program.\u201d Does sending out checks to seniors a few weeks before an election accomplish these objectives? In a word, no.<\/p>\n<p>Second, because the statutory text says the MIF applies to the \u201coriginal Medicare fee-for-service program,\u201d seniors <a href=\"https:\/\/www.cms.gov\/newsroom\/fact-sheets\/medicare-improvement-fund-premium-rebate-frequently-asked-questions\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">enrolled in Medicare Advantage<\/a> plans \u2014 which enroll the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.cbo.gov\/system\/files\/2026-02\/51302-2026-02-medicare.pdf\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">majority of seniors<\/a>\u2014 can\u2019t qualify for the rebates. (Seniors with higher incomes who are subject to means-tested premiums, or with low incomes whose premiums are paid by state Medicaid programs, also won\u2019t receive them.)<\/p>\n<p>So what\u2019s the point of hyping up checks that most seniors won\u2019t receive? This gambit has echoes of the $250 rebate checks for seniors in the Medicare prescription drug \u201cdoughnut hole\u201d that Democrats added to <a href=\"https:\/\/housedocs.house.gov\/energycommerce\/ppacacon.pdf\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Obamacare<\/a> in an attempt to offset political criticism of the law before the 2010 midterm elections. I worked on Capitol Hill at the time, and Republican staff generally <a href=\"https:\/\/www.juniperresearchgroup.com\/post\/2582\/what-a-250-rebate-check-will-buy-in-donald-berwicks-world\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">mocked the rebates<\/a> as going to a small portion of seniors, and insufficient to offset Obamacare\u2019s massive disruptions. (This year\u2019s rebates will go to more seniors, but provide a smaller cash amount than the 2010 payments.)<\/p>\n<p>Third, as noted above, whereas Trump\u2019s earlier rebates to those who enrolled in exchange plans represented a refund of excess \u201cuser fees\u201d that the enrollees themselves paid in, the Medicare funds in the MIF come from a combination of payroll taxes and general government revenues. <\/p>\n<p>In other words, the payments represent yet another wealth transfer from younger generations to seniors. And contrary to popular opinion, no, this isn\u2019t a case where seniors had \u201cearned\u201d this payment. The average senior gets <a href=\"http:\/\/thefederalist.com\/2016\/12\/07\/no-medicare-recipients-havent-earned-benefits\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">far more out of the Medicare program<\/a> than they ever \u201cpaid in\u201d \u2014 a situation that the rebates will only make worse.<\/p>\n<h2><strong>Insolvent Program<\/strong><\/h2>\n<p>Lastly, and most importantly, Medicare is <a href=\"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/2022\/06\/10\/fact-check-medicare-is-already-functionally-insolvent\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">functionally insolvent<\/a>, and has been for roughly a decade. Just before Obamacare\u2019s passage, the Medicare trust fund was <a href=\"https:\/\/www.cms.gov\/Research-Statistics-Data-and-Systems\/Statistics-Trends-and-Reports\/ReportsTrustFunds\/Downloads\/TR2009.pdf\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">projected<\/a> to become insolvent by 2017. Only Obamacare\u2019s phony accounting \u2014 whereby the Obama Administration <a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=ukaIZ7pmabo\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">claimed<\/a> that the same money was both paying for Obamacare and extending the life of the Medicare trust fund \u2014 has staved off the program\u2019s insolvency, at least on paper.<\/p>\n<p>Because of Medicare\u2019s poor financial condition, lawmakers should be looking to reduce program spending and improve its solvency in <em>every bill they pass<\/em>. They shouldn\u2019t be \u201cparking\u201d savings in the MIF so they can turn around and spend those savings later.<\/p>\n<p>Trump\u2019s rebate gambit did expose the gimmick behind the MIF. But, contrary to <a href=\"https:\/\/truthsocial.com\/@realDonaldTrump\/posts\/117374727722154598\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">his claim<\/a>, sending out checks to a program that can barely keep the lights on won\u2019t \u201cprotect and preserve Medicare.\u201d It will undermine it further.<\/p>\n<hr>\n<div>\n<p>      Chris Jacobs is founder and CEO of Juniper Research Group and author of the book &#8220;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.amazon.com\/dp\/1645720020\">The Case Against Single Payer<\/a>.&#8221; He is on Twitter: <a href=\"http:\/\/twitter.com\/chrisjacobsHC\">@chrisjacobsHC<\/a>.<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n<p><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Medicare rebates use taxpayer funds, not enrollees&#8217; fees<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":521,"featured_media":2677863,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mo_disable_npp":"","fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/10\/pexels-shvets-production-7545252.jpg","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[33651],"tags":[38313,4159,3634],"class_list":["post-2677862","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-the-western-journal","tag-health-policy","tag-medicare","tag-trump"],"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/10\/pexels-shvets-production-7545252.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2677862","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/521"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2677862"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2677862\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2677866,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2677862\/revisions\/2677866"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2677863"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2677862"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2677862"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2677862"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}