Making a stop in New York’s 21st Congressional District, the two Democratic representatives criticized Rep. Elise Stefanik for her vote to pass the One, Big Beautiful Bill Act.
By Brenne Sheehan
U.S. Reps. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Paul Tonko criticized the recently passed “One Big, Beautiful Bill Act,” highlighting its impacts on Medicaid, Medicare and cancer research funding during a town hall event Sunday in Plattsburgh.
Traveling up to New York’s 21st Congressional District, the northern part of the state represented by Republican Rep. Elise Stefanik, the event—which filled the Strand Theatre’s 950 seats and drew a crowd of hundreds more outside—featured remarks by Cortez, Tonko, local healthcare workers and an audience Q&A. Cortez represents New York’s 14th congressional district in the Bronx and part of Queens and Tonko represents New York’s 20th congressional district in Albany, Saratoga, Schenectady, Montgomery and Rensselaer counties.
On July 4, Pres. Donald Trump signed the Republican-backed “One Big Beautiful Bill Act,” a budget reconciliation law that cuts federal spending and extends Trump-era tax breaks. It adds new Medicaid eligibility requirements, bans new state provider taxes to fund Medicaid, and lowers the federal match rate from 90% to 80% for states covering immigrants without qualified Medicaid status.
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The law will result in over $1 trillion cuts to federal Medicaid spending and increase the number of uninsured people by 11.6 million over the next 10 years, according to the Congressional Budget Office’s latest cost estimate.
“While Republicans make deep cuts to healthcare, we’re fighting for a future where everyone has affordable healthcare,” Tonko said. “And when you tinker with Medicaid and Medicare to the tune of $1.5 trillion, you are going to make a major dent into service, affordability, and accessibility to healthcare. Make no mistake about it.”
About 250,000 North Country residents are recipients of Medicaid coverage, according to the Healthcare Coalition of the North Country.
Cortez said that Stefanik “voted against her own people,” in passing the legislation, pointing to rural hospitals in the North Country who have expressed concern over Medicaid cuts and limiting rural access to care. A report by the Kaiser Family Foundation predicts federal Medicaid spending in rural areas will decrease by $155 billion over the next 10 years.
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“Massena Hospital and Clifton-Fine Hospital in Star Lake—that hospital is now going to have a much harder time keeping its doors open, thanks to Elise Stefanik. Gouverneur Hospital and Lewis County General Hospital in Lowville have the same story,” Cortez said. “We shouldn’t reward people like this with elected positions in office of public trust. 44,000 New Yorkers in this district alone will be kicked off of Medicaid thanks to her actions.”
In opening remarks, Champlain Valley Physician’s Hospital United Healthcare Workers East (1199SEIU) member Marvin Shaw, who has been cancer free for five years, said that Medicaid covers 1 in 10 and 1 in 3 children with cancer, as well as 3 in 5 nursing home residents. He shared that with the implemented cuts to Medicaid, more people in rural areas will lose coverage for cancer treatments.
“In rural areas like ours, people with cancer who are on Medicaid are more likely to survive because they have the coverage they need for the treatment plans that will save their lives,” Shaw said. “People we know and love will go without healthcare coverage and forgo their treatments that will save their lives. These cuts are devastating and cruel, and I’m ashamed that my congressional representative, Elise Stefanik, voted in favor of taking away life-saving care.”
Cortez said Republicans overstate the issue of Medicaid coverage for undocumented immigrants. In New York, undocumented immigrants can be covered by Emergency Medicaid for life-threatening conditions and childbirth. The program is funded by both federal and state governments, but the new law reduces federal support to states that provide these services.
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“If you repeat something enough, they’ll convince everybody that there are millions of undocumented people on Medicaid and Medicare when undocumented people are not entitled to a federal dollar in these programs, and they know that,” Cortez said. “But they use this because they want us all to turn against each other in order to cut our nose to spite our face. And we will not be fooled by their nonsense anymore.”
Earlier this month, in a statement to Adirondack Explorer, a spokesperson for Stefanik cited an Empire Center study estimating $20 billion in annual Medicaid fraud and a 1,200% rise in Emergency Medicaid costs in New York since 2014.
“There are no cuts to Medicaid and the fact is that the bill actually increases Medicaid by eliminating billions in waste, fraud and abuse. All New Yorkers support ending waste, fraud, and abuse in Medicaid,” the statement said. “Far Left NY Democrats like Kathy Hochul continue to fearmonger because they know that President Trump and Elise Stefanik are delivering results for the American people.”
The OBBBA reduces federal Affordable Care Act subsidies, driving up marketplace premiums—especially for low-income and high-risk individuals. The Kaiser Family Foundation estimates that out-of-pocket premium costs will rise by 75% under the new law.
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At the event, an audience member shared they currently pay $1,200 a month for their health insurance for a high-deductible plan.
“It already speaks to how challenging and broken our healthcare system is just to begin with,” Cortez said. “We have to put pressure to cancel these cuts and do what we can to reverse what’s possible.”
In a Monday statement to Adirondack Explorer, a spokesperson for Stefanik said local North Country Democrats were “eerily quiet” on Cortez and Tonko’s visit, citing Cortez’s “Far Left Democrat Socialist policies that have hurt New York families.”
“Thank you for the political gift of a radical Far Left Socialist’s visit to the North Country. It’s like pouring jet fuel on Elise Stefanik’s strong support in Upstate New York,” the statement reads. “AOC is the leader of radical policies like the Green New Scam, abolishing ICE, defunding the police and gun bans. North Country Republicans, Independents, and Democrats reject these insane policies.”
Image at the top: New York Reps. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Paul Tonko greet an audience at a Plattsburgh Town Hall Sunday. Photo by Emilie Allen.
The national debt was, in our Congresswoman Elise Stefanik’s words two years ago, “one of the greatest threats in our nation….” Now, she votes for a bill that will add $3.4 trillion to the debt.
What you don’t hear from the Republicans who support Trump’s so-called “One Big, Beautiful Bill Act” is the fact it will add $3.4 trillion to the U.S. national debt over the next decade, according to a report the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office.
Our Congresswoman Elise Stefanik is silent on the national debt, now that she is adding trillions to it. But she wasn’t silent just two years ago when she said this:
“I want to echo the sentiments and thank Speaker McCarthy for bringing together, on a bipartisan basis, this very productive briefing on one of the greatest threats that we face in our nation, that every family faces. Our debt is unsustainable.” (Stefanik, March 9, 2023)
Our Congresswoman Stefanik will support whatever Trump tells her to support.