Tipsheet

Do Republicans 'Want Medicare and Social Security to Sunset'?

Mia Cathell
Mia Cathell  |  February 10, 2023 2:05 PM

Chaos erupted in the U.S. Capitol on the night of President Joe Biden's second State of the Union address when he repeated a favorite but long-debunked Democratic talking point on Republicans supposedly wanting to sunset Social Security and Medicare.

CLAIM: "Instead of making the wealthy pay their fair share, some Republicans want Medicare and Social Security to sunset. I'm not saying it’s a majority—" Biden claimed before he was booed by Republican congressional members, including GOP Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA), who shouted, "Liar!" The jeers from House Republicans then prompted Biden to backtrack.

"Anybody who doubts it, contact my office. I'll give you a copy of the proposal," Biden continued, adding at another point: "Other Republicans say—I'm not saying it's a majority of you. I don't even think it's a significant—but it's being proposed by individuals."

Biden continued to assert in the House Chamber that he's "politely not naming them, but it's being proposed by some of you."

FACTS: Biden was citing Sen. Rick Scott's (R-FL) "11-Point Plan to Rescue America," released last February, which proposed that "All federal legislation sunsets in 5 years. If a law is worth keeping, Congress can pass it again."

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Since its release, many Senate Republicans, such as Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY), have strongly disavowed the plan. "That will not be part of a Republican Senate majority agenda," McConnell stated in early March 2022, appearing at a press conference outside the Senate chamber, where Scott was speaking at the podium moments before he walked away.

In an interview Thursday on The Terry Meiners Show, McConnell reiterated that "it's clearly the Rick Scott plan" and "not the Republican plan," noting that Republicans never planned to implement Scott's policy had the party won the majority in November.

House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) has remarked that "cuts to Medicare and Social Security...are off the table" in debt ceiling talks. McConnell, echoing McCarthy's promises that the old-age programs wouldn't be touched, said that since he and McCarthy are in GOP leadership positions, the pair has more authority to "state what the position of the party is than any single senator."

Scott has explained that his plan is meant to examine and reform federal programs like Social Security and Medicare, not eliminate them. In a Fox News interview, Scott insisted that he wants to "preserve" Social Security and Medicare. 

"No one that I know of wants to sunset Medicare or Social Security, but what we’re doing is we don't even talk about it," Scott said. "Medicare goes bankrupt in four years. Social Security goes bankrupt in 12 years. I think we ought to figure out how we preserve those programs. Every program that we care about, we ought to stop and take the time to preserve those programs."

Even liberal outlets have found Biden's characterization of the GOP's Social Security and Medicare plan to be misleading. Republicans have repeatedly declared that mainstream GOP members have no intention of ending these federal entitlements.

House Majority Leader Rep. Steve Scalise (R-LA) told "Fox News Sunday" that Republican lawmakers have "proposed strengthening and shoring up Medicare and Social Security, which are both, by the way, headed for bankruptcy if we do nothing."

During a speech Wednesday at a Wisconsin rally, Biden wouldn't back down on the matter and read a placard with a 2022 quote from Sen. Ron Johnson (R-WI), in which the latter called for Social Security and Medicare entitlements to be transitioned from mandatory to discretionary spending, which would require Congress to budget for each of these programs on an annual basis.

"President Biden is lying about me. He lied last night, and he lied again today. I never suggested putting Medicare & Social Security on the chopping block. It was Joe Biden himself who suggested freezing these programs," Johnson told Fox News. Johnson's comment referred to introduced legislation from 1975 while then-senator Biden pushed a bill requiring all federal programs to sunset after four years. Biden said, "it requires every program to be looked at freshly at least once every four years."

"The examination is not just of the increased cost of the program, but of the worthiness of the entire program," Biden said in 1975.

On the Senate floor, Biden elucidated in the 1990s: "When I argued that we should freeze federal spending, I meant Social Security as well. I meant Medicare and Medicaid." The former Delaware senator added that he meant benefits for veterans, too.

"I want to save these programs," Johnson continued in his Fox News Digital statement. "I have simply pointed out the greatest threat to these programs is out of control debt and deficits. We need a process to prioritize spending and decrease our deficits."

RATING: Biden's claim that Republicans want Social Security and Medicare to sunset is FALSE. Not even the person who authored the 11-point plan Biden referenced says he supports a so-called "sunset" of the generations-old programs.

Even so, the proposal has failed to garner widespread support among the Republican Party and its leadership.