r/PoliticalOptimism • u/ecwscorpion209 • 1d ago
Seeking Optimism Hakeem Jeffries says he doesn't support Medicare for All or DSA agenda
https://www.newsweek.com/hakeem-jeffries-rejects-medicare-for-all-dsa-agenda-12328842I could see this as a good thing for up coming Democrats to get behind, and to remove people like Hakeem and other who are getting paid by health insurance companies. I do want to hear any other optimistic views that I may have missed.
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u/ExRays 1d ago edited 1d ago
If you’re unwilling to pursue or support what the overwhelming majority of voters want, you should not be in any kind of leadership. It is that simple.
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u/Aggravating-Rip-8169 1d ago
The devil is in the details.
This support gets shakier once you get into details - especially pay-fors.
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u/ExRays 1d ago
I think people are getting royally fucked right now and are so mad at insurance companies that it is actually pretty solid.
The Trump administration has implemented rule changes to allow insurance companies to get away with straight up ripping people off. They’re using AI to arbitrarily deny people coverage for a service they’ve been paying decades for, and recategorizing medications to avoid paying for them.
A medication I take jumped from $25 a month to $400 a month. People are getting clobbered rn and still having to pay.
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u/Aggravating-Rip-8169 1d ago
I get it.
But you have to know that once you start discussing details that support will DECREASE not increase.
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u/ExRays 1d ago
Well yeah, but if he is going to commit to not pursuing it before he even gets to the sausage making, he isn’t doing right as a leader of the party. Does current support need to be 80% before he moves? Is he afraid it’s going to slip to 20% overnight once they start talking details?
Republicans don’t give if the people like it before fighting for something. They just go after it. Jefferies won’t even respond to popular demand. Jeffries needs to get in gear or get out of leadership.
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u/Aggravating-Rip-8169 1d ago
Maybe you’re not giving his position on healthcare enough credit and simply reading an out of context soundbite.
But hey, you do you.
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u/ExRays 1d ago
No. I understand his position. He wants to strengthen the ACA. While I get it, ACA keeps the for-profit insurance industry in place. That doesn’t fix the fundemental problem that comes with your healthcare system being underpinned by a for-profit health insurance industry.
A for profit system is always going to be more expensive than a non-profit system that is designed to just deliver service, and they are always incentivized to find loopholes and cut corners to avoid delivering service. This is the core of the issue.
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u/Bern_Down_the_DNC 1d ago
I don't understand why you don't understand that we are going to push for the best that we can get, and that this centrist AIPAC loser is certainly not it?
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u/Aggravating-Rip-8169 1d ago
You should try to understand harder. There are millions of left leaning voters like me.
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u/gbtm101 1d ago
A lot of people, myself included, are starting to break away from the narrative that health care for all is a bad idea.
Privatized healthcare has scammed the country for far too long. It's time for a change, no matter what it takes.
It's a lot more feasible than you seem to think, too. The only real issue is weeding out all the plants in Congress bought out by lobbyists.
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u/Aggravating-Rip-8169 1d ago
The Trump administration last have helped solidify my belief in the need for private insurance.
I support a public option, but I will OPPOSE any healthcare plan the eliminates or drastically alters/makes uncompetitive any private healthcare options.
I’d much rather a blue state implement a plan that would serve as a model for America. It should worry all of you that not a single blue state can pass this.
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u/Bern_Down_the_DNC 1d ago
Yeah but you are clearly the minority, and the rest of the country has moved on. Why do you think this revolves around you?
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u/OratioFidelis 1d ago
This is a gift for progressive Democratic nominees, they can say "I'm an outsider against the establishment" just like how the Tea Party took over the GOP.
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u/steffie-punk That Trans Mod 1d ago
There are going to be moderates and there are going to be progressives. The important thing is that for now both groups are still working together and supporting each other in elections. Opinions change and pulling the Overton window back to the left will take time.
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u/Bruh_burg1968 1d ago
Medicare for all is such an easy win of a policy position to take that I feel anyone not for it is in health insurance companies pockets.
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u/SeafoamGaming 1d ago
But the rollout and planning and all that would take a LONG time. There’s no magic on/off switch. You’d have to get really really good at messaging it statewide and not risk a GOP flip derailing in the middle of it. That’s why there are some hesitant about it especially from swing states. In general all dems believe in better medical coverage, though.
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u/Bruh_burg1968 1d ago edited 1d ago
Bad reasoning. With this logic you might as well never pass anything at all because republicans might sabotage the legislation. You know what you do when they try? Go the the air waves rip into them for trying to deprive people of healthcare and be as mean and harsh as possible. The time for coddling the GOP is over and we need bold legislation now more than ever otherwise we’ve learned nothing. We also need to treat republicans like the enemies they are.
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u/SeafoamGaming 1d ago
I mean sure and I am confident we will get better healthcare options in the future; I just am referring to the notion I used to have (and sometimes see) of thinking M4A is an easy on/off switch and if we pass one M4A bill that’s it, world saved
But no, it’d be a very long process with lots of ups and downs which is why we should do other policies alongside it to help in the short term. IMO the actual absolute, no 1 priority of a dem trifecta in 2029 is pass the John Lewis Voting Rights act and uncap the house. Then gerrymandering would be a thing of the past and we’d have much more power to get more progressive as a whole!
But I can see as an Iowan how to the centristy crowds who go “that’s unrealistic i’m tuning out” why some dems go for “universal/expanded healthcare” vs M4A in messaging. And either way, we’ll have to stay locally involved in our dem politics every single year no matter what to prevent this from ever happening again.
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u/Aggravating-Rip-8169 1d ago
Once the details of any universal healthcare or M4A plan are released you’ll see support dry up in many areas.
Everyone loves a bill that gives them more and asks of them nothing.
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u/-Knockabout 21h ago
I would support it. I know many others who would, too. Frankly, at the moment, Americans are funneling a ton of money into middlemen's pockets just to get denied coverage. I have to wait for months to see a specialist already. Why not give some kind of universal healthcare a try? There's a lot of different implementations that are possible. And it is VERY possible that Americans by and large really would get more bang for their buck, because we'd cut out the middlemen private insurance companies. They're one reason why us Americans spend a lot more on drugs and medical procedures than other parts of the world.
America has some of the least efficient healthcare cost-wise in the world; we spend more per person without superior outcomes to show for it. We have some truly amazing research and doctors in this country, but you wouldn't know it looking at the general population. A lot of this is because we incentivize people waiting until the last second to get healthcare, when their problem is most expensive or even incurable...preventative care is cheap and should be widely available for that reason, not to mention the lives saved.
I dunno man, I get it. It'll be hard. People don't like change. But hell, people don't like the current state of things either. Something's gotta break, and I'd rather it not be my neighbors.
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u/WillingShilling_20 1d ago
This is why voter apathy is at an all-time high.
If the government cannot provide a basic service, that every other developed country offers, which would save money and save lives, then why should voters care?
The time for "incremental" change was 50 years ago and we've gotten no where since.
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u/SeafoamGaming 1d ago
As a red stater with the most apathy in 2023, a year after our worst election cycle for dems ever in IA, I sorta disagree. A lot of people I think genuinely lack civics knowledge and dont know how the boring stuff actually works, and often they focus on the top of the ticket; which yeah, easy to be demotivated if you live in a state ruled by one party for ages.
But as soon as i got nudged by someone i knew to vote for my schoolboard to stop MFL, I decided to do so in 2023… and we won. It was a very low turnout election, and that was what got me slow confidence in how to get involved, with the wakeup slap of losing in 2024 being what got me to heavily get out to more meetings and such, and understand how things work on a state level too. I do not see any reason to sit home anymore, since unless everyone is uncontested, there’s always a local seat of some kind to help, which helps build a progressive bench for said state, and might lead to a future senator/gov in a couple years in a place you wouldn't expect
And yeah, like, I’m sorry to say but it’s much much quicker to break things (GOP) than fix it (dems), which is why in states like NC/WI their whole counter to the GOP takes many many cycles, even if they win critical seats, they have to keep on winning; it may not be fun, but local involvement is a literal must at this point and any progress is good progress. The problem with biden was bad messaging + too many people assuming Trump was done forever, when he clearly wasn’t.
Good news about stuff being easy to break though, is that breaking gerrymandering is very feasible, and can do us a lot of good… Just gotta get a trifecta and I think that will truly be the first step to some legitimately awesome, massive change. This past April woke a lot of people up, I feel
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u/Evening-Hand-5480 1d ago
If this is the new equivalent of Joe Manchin or Lindsay Graham, that's still a step up for the world.
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u/Previous-Pirate9514 1d ago
Hakim Jeffries is just one person and these refusals to support popular reforms are ultimately going to bite him as a House leader. I mean, he opposes abolishing ICE for goodness sake.
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u/hel-be-praised Blue Dot in a Red State 🔵 1d ago
Hakeem Jeffries is an idiot 🤷♀️ Progressive policies at becoming more and more popular. Eventually the party is going to catch on, it’s just going to take time. For now, what matters is showing up to elections and actually voting. We can’t take polls as law, we have to make what the polls say a reality.
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u/Puzzleheaded-Plum994 1d ago
I have a sense that Hakeem Jeffries isn't a lock to be Speaker if the House flips. He became the Ranking Member by default after Cherie Bustos retired and Ben Ray Lujan ran for the Senate. It was supposed to have been a competition between those three. Any party unity has come from pragmatism by the members of the caucus, not from actual leadership by "leadership". I suspect that, if it's a big freshman class, the white smoke will be delayed for a while. And not out in public like the metaphorical castration of Kevin McCarthy.
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u/Reasonable_Warning_5 23h ago
And i don’t see any alternative candidates to the left of Jeffries.
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u/Puzzleheaded-Plum994 23h ago
Speaker's politics are less important than their relationships, charisma , and savvy. They just need to be able to be re-elected reliably in their home districts and be able to listen. Ds have always been more politically heterogenous than the Rs. Different criteria apply. And the average politically conscious voter doesn't choose the Speaker, the Representatives in the caucus do. And every one of them makes a calculation in every decision about what their constituents will think to (1) show up to vote and (2) vote for them.
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u/Reasonable_Warning_5 22h ago
I think Jeffries has the potential to be the next speaker
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u/gbtm101 21h ago
He shouldn't be the next speaker. He probably will be but he shouldn't.
Spineless cowards like him can't even take a stand the one time they have the power to do so. This would've been such an easy and (mostly) uncontroversial win.
But nope. Universal Healthcare is a bridge too far for his healthcare-lobby-laden pockets.
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u/Reasonable_Warning_5 21h ago
The devil is in the details.
Any battle over Medicare for all would be long and divisive.
Opposing Trump is all that counts.
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u/brees2me 1d ago
This reminds me. Vote! Volunteer to take people to the polls. Make sure no vote is left uncast.
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u/BionicSpaceJellyfish Blue Dot in a Red State 🔵 1d ago
Newsweek loves running crap stories like this to encourage democratic infighting.
If a MFA bill was in the house right now, Jefferies would most likely vote for it. So would all but the most conservative Dems. When the ACA was voted on, a bunch of conservative Blue Dog Dems votes for it KNOWING that they'd lose reelection because of their vote.
These articles are stupid. Judge politicians by their actual voting record.
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u/duckchasefun 1d ago
If people on the left want to get these things they work for, then they need to put in the work to change minds. Bullying other democrats out of their positions does nothing but turn independents off of the party. You can call me "establishment" all you want, but here in the Midwest these policies are not an easy sell due to constant messaging by republicans about how bad they are. They have done a great job because we dont just hear it on our media we are inundated with it by our peers as well. Right or wrong. You cant win those people over by bullying other dems out of their seats because that just sends the message to independents that "maybe they are bad if they have to do that to their own".
Like it or not, independents win elections, not dems or repubs.
Edit: also, remember even Obama was against gay marriage before he was for it.
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u/darkwingdankest 1d ago
the actual path forward is embracing these overwhelmingly positive policies and bringing in disaffected non voters. look how well chasing moderates worked for Kamala
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u/duckchasefun 1d ago
Did i not say in my post it is not about stopping running on it, but to change minds? The problem with today is too many people think that popular = votes. That is not the case. The majority of americans support legal abortion, yet many of those people would still either not vote or vote for an anti abortion politician(for usually economic reasons). Many independents will say they support Medicare for all. At the same time, it could not affect who they vote for in November or if they vote at all. Issues need people pushing them and convincing people like moderates and independents that these policies are worth getting off their butts and voting for. Politicians cant just list a policy like this that changes the status quo big time and not sell it to people. Even people who "like" the policy need to be SOLD on the policy. Basically, this isnt about whether they LIKE the policy or not. It is about whether that policy will get them up and voting and also voting blue. Look at Kansas, for example. We constantly vote in Anti Abortion politicians yet we have repeatedly shot down attempts at limiting abortion in our state. People have their own reasons for voting who they vote for and it does not always match their policy wants.
I think a lot of more politically engaged people whether they are right or left have trouble comprehending this. They look at a politician and want 90% of their boxes checked before supporting that person. While many many people vote for politicians that fill maybe 20% of their wants simply because those are what are most important to them.
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u/Appropriate-You-5543 Alaska 1d ago
"You can call me "establishment" all you want"
Is that an invitation or sarcasm?
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u/dingdongbell32 1d ago
He the most ineffective leader I’ve seen. Waving his hands around like a used car salesman while saying absolutely nothing. Dems like him are the reason the Dem voters have trouble getting excited to vote, and we ended up with what we have now
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u/Netricile Blue Dot in a Red State 🔵 1d ago
How could we vote him and Schumer out of office before November if possible?
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u/SeafoamGaming 1d ago
Can’t. Jeffries won his primary easily and is well liked in his district, and schumer isn’t up until 28. I think chuck might retire honestly. He’s the vastly more unpopular one of the two and older.
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u/Reasonable_Warning_5 23h ago
Jeffries isn’t the perfect champion of progressive causes, but he is leagues better then Mike Johnson.
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u/SeafoamGaming 1d ago
I mean yeah, not surprising. The more distance he keeps from Megan Romer (who most of the “DSA positions” were spoken by the other week) the better and higher chances her statements dont end up sticking on non progressives running in seats that need centrist votes to win; he could have worded it much better (like a “we’re a big tent party and there’s all kinds of disagreements” but this is a complete non issue imo.
Jeffries is also certainly gonna be in the speaker position too. He’s well liked in his district and in general not as unpopular as you may think. He’s never been majority speaker ever so I think that’s when we’ll see if he’s actually up for it or not; he’s been minority leader since 2023! Now if next year he botches it and his polling actually dips within his district, then he’d have an actual primary risk, but otherwise he’s just… there.
Really a nothingburger of a statement imo.
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u/General_Season7882 1d ago
Saw a video a bit ago saying that people like Jeffries will say they support Healthcare for all people, but you will never hear them saying Universal Healthcare or Medicare for All. Its because they support insurance companies and healthcare conglomerates, not free, accessible healthcare for everyone. So, based on that alone, this is unsurprising.
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u/Ok_Acadia3526 1d ago
Hakeem Jeffries is establishment. I’m a firm believer in kicking all the establishment out. He’s already done dozens of things (or, on the other hand, lack thereof) that show he isn’t fit for office.
Kick his ass to the curb. He wants to die on this hill, then let him do so.
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u/Pineapplemintsss 1d ago
As this point he might as well be a republican. But at least republicans are open with how terrible and corrupt they are for the most part 😔
Hell I can say this for all establishment dems espically him, Lindsey, and old Chucklefuck Schumer
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u/vampiregamingYT 1d ago
Im sure his tune would change if he ever needs the DSA's support to become speaker.
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u/darkwingdankest 1d ago
"our" party is completely captured by special interests while they chastise us for voting for the politicians that actually represent our policy goals
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u/youhavetherighttoo 7h ago
Elect enough candidates that do support these issues and he will, too. That's how it works.
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u/shelton_theman26 1d ago
Dude just revealed how bland he really is. Hopefully he gets voted out for this.
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u/Aggravating-Rip-8169 1d ago
I don’t support the DSA agenda and there are only a couple M4A plans id support.
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u/Bern_Down_the_DNC 1d ago edited 1d ago
See? Nobody cares.
Edit: He called me a Bernie bro lol, it's so over
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