Warren Confronts Medicare For All Criticism, Talks Climate

Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren spoke about Washington corruption and fielded questions about topics like climate change during a Sunday campaign event in Indianola, Iowa today before finally addressing recent attacks on her plan to pay for ‘Medicare for All’ during closing remarks.

Warren has steadily risen in Iowa’s polls despite facing recent heat from competitors like South Bend, Indiana, Mayor Pete Buttigieg and Minnesota Sen. Amy Klobuchar on the national stage about her health care policies. At her first stop in Iowa following the Oct. 15 debate, the state’s Democratic frontrunner briefly said she would soon release a plan detailing how her administration will afford universal health care coverage after over an hour without any mention of the topic.

“I plan over the next few weeks to put out a plan that talks, specifically, about the cost of ‘Medicare for All’ and how we pay for it,” Warren said at the end of a town hall at Simpson College. “I will not sign a bill into law that does not reduce the cost of health care for middle-class families.”

Most who attended the town hall didn’t come to hear the Senator respond to the recent controversy. Waukee resident Elizabeth Faver said she attended the event to inform her caucus decision in February. 

“[Warren addressing the ‘Medicare for All’ controversy] wasn’t one of my higher interest points,” Faver said. “This is my first event for this presidential race. I don’t even know if she’s who I will eventually be voting for, right now I’m trying to inform myself as much as possible.”

Faver said she was happy with how the Senator ended up addressing the issue, however.

“She responded in the way I hoped she would have,” Faver said. “She’s a force to be reckoned with. She’s fierce.”

Simpson College student Jordan Baldwin, 21, said he came to scope out how the candidate would fare as his second or third choice—the Iowa City native said he’s committed to caucus for Beto O’Rourke.

“She didn’t really talk about ‘Medicare for All,’ and that was the main point of attack from Pete Buttigieg and others that are kind of more on the moderate side of the spectrum,” Baldwin said. “But I feel like overall she did a really good job here to actually speak and answer the questions that people asked her— she responded really well to those.”

Warren spent most of her time at the town hall discussing her trademark fight against big, dark money in the nation’s capital. Warren denounced big oil and other polluters’ roots in Washington D.C.

“You want to understand the climate crisis we face today? It is 25 years of corruption in Washington,” she said.

The candidate then responded to three audience questions — none of which were about ‘Medicare for All.’

Instead, Ryan from Des Moines wanted to know more about Warren’s climate policies. He said the conversation is “inextricably and inexcusably” missing from the stump and the stage, asking the candidate if “we can count on you to raise the climate crisis to the forefront of the election.”

“Ryan is right,” Warren said, going on to highlight her plans for environmental justice and green manufacturing. “But nothing is going to happen so long as Washington remains as corrupt as it is.”

by Isabella Murray
Posted 10/20/19