Elizabeth Warren Dodges Question on Eliminating Private Health Insurance

HOUSTON, Texas — Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) dodged a question about whether her health care policy would eliminate private health insurance and raise takes at the third Democrat debate Thursday evening at Texas Southern University.

ABC News moderator George Stephnopoulos asked Warren specifically about raising taxes and eliminating private health insurance after former Vice President Joe Biden challenged her and Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) about the cost of their “Medicare for All” policies (which he said would be twice the current federal budget).

Warren said that her plan would reduce “costs,” and claimed that patients would still be able to keep seeing their preferred doctors (a promise President Barack Obama also made about Obamacare, which he ultimately broke). She also acknowledged Obama’s policy, saying he “fundamentally transformed health care in America.”

But she never answered the question about private health insurance or taxes.

In the first Democrat debate in Miami, Florida, Warren raised her hand when NBC News moderator Lester Holt asked which candidates would eliminate private health insurance as part of their health care plans.

Warren also dodged the question about raising taxes on middle class households at that debate.

Sen. Amy Kloubuchar (D-MN) and South Bend, Indiana, Mayor Pete Buttiegieg joined Biden in attacking Sanders and Warren over “Medicare for All.” Sen. Kamala Harris (D-CA), who has waffled on the question of eliminating private health insurance, thanked Sanders for his plan but said her plan — which does not call for new taxes on the middle class — was better.

Joel B. Pollak is Senior Editor-at-Large at Breitbart News. He earned an A.B. in Social Studies and Environmental Science and Public Policy from Harvard College, and a J.D. from Harvard Law School. He is a winner of the 2018 Robert Novak Journalism Alumni Fellowship. He is also the co-author of How Trump Won: The Inside Story of a Revolution, which is available from Regnery. Follow him on Twitter at @joelpollak.