A new 72-page report conducted by the White House Council of Economic Advisers published on Tuesday warned Americans of a socialist "comeback in American political discourse" and took aim at discrediting Medicare for All.
The report, released just two weeks before the midterms, stated its purpose was to discover the "effects of socialist policies." It named specific policies—and politicians—that the Trump administration opposes, such as free college tuition and government-run health insurance. Both are policies strongly supported by Senators Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren, who are potential Trump opponents in 2020 and were specifically mentioned in the report.
The White House cited countries like China, Cuba, Venezuela and the former Soviet Union as examples of socialism gone wrong.
In recent weeks, Trump has said that Americans need to vote Republican on Election Day, falsely claiming that Democrats want to "model America's economy after Venezuela," with "radical socialism" and "open borders."
"Coincident with the 200th anniversary of Karl Marx's birth, socialism is making a comeback in American political discourse," the White House said in the report. "Detailed policy proposals from self-declared socialists are gaining support in Congress and among much of the electorate."
The report, titled "The Opportunity Costs of Socialism," is similar in tone and content to that of the president's recent USA Today op-ed denigrating Medicare for All and Democrats. The paper later fact-checked Trump's opinion column, concluding the president's piece was a "series of false and misleading statements about Medicare and health insurance in general."
In a phone call with reporters following the report's release, the chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers, Kevin Hassett, defended the group's decision to focus time and resources on the topic of socialism. Because socialism was "something we've been reading about in the news" lately, it was the council's job to research the topic to "help inform a public debate," Hassett said.
The White House's socialism report argued that if Medicare for All were paid for with increased taxes, gross domestic product "would fall by 9 percent, or about $7,000 per person in 2022, due to high tax rates that would reduce incentives to supply the factors of production."
The report referenced Sanders, an independent and self-described democratic socialist who has advocated for Medicare for All, more than a dozen times, labeling him as the "leading socialist in Federal politics today." It also referenced Warren, a Democrat who has sided with Sanders on such issues as health care and education reform. The White House report compared the two senators to communist leaders.
"The Chinese leader Mao Zedong, who cited Marxism as the model for his country, described 'the ruthless economic exploitation and political oppression of the peasants by the landlord class,'" the report said. "Expressing similar concerns, current American senators Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren have stated that 'large corporations...exploit human misery and insecurity, and turn them into huge profits' and 'giant corporations...exploit workers just to boost their own profits.'"
Sanders's office could not be immediately reached by Newsweek for comment on Tuesday about the White House's comparing of him and Warren to communist leaders.
A spokesperson for Warren referred Newsweek to past comments made by the Massachusetts senator, in which Warren said she was a capitalist and believed in free markets. But she's also highlighted the need for regulation. Warren was the original proponent of the Bureau of Consumer Financial Protection, and, she told The Atlantic, it aimed to make "markets work for people, not making markets work for a handful of companies that scrape all the value off to themselves."
"Markets without rules is about the rich take it all, it's about the powerful get all of it," Warren told CNBC in July. "And that's what's gone wrong in America."
A Reuters–Ipsos survey this summer found that 70 percent of Americans, including 85 percent of Democrats and 52 percent of Republicans, supported Medicare for All. The proposal, also known as a single-payer system, has seen a particular increase in support among the Democratic Party and its candidates in recent years, including political newcomer and self-described democratic socialist Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. The congressional candidate from New York was briefly mentioned in the White House's "references" section of the report.
Supporters of Medicare for All or single-payer health care systems argue they would provide affordable health care to everyone by allowing the government to decrease the cost of health care services and rid the system of middleman private insurance companies. Opponents insist they would limit health care provider options and cause an increase in taxes that would outweigh any benefits.
Update: This story has been updated to include Kevin Hassett's comments to reporters and past comments made by Elizabeth Warren.
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Newsweek is committed to challenging conventional wisdom and finding connections in the search for common ground.
About the writer
Ramsey Touchberry is a Washington Correspondent for Newsweek based in the nation's capital, where he regularly covers Congress.
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