RUTHFULLY YOURS

We have no doubt that, in the years to come, the media will describe the Biden-Harris administration as “scandal-free.” But that’s only because for the past four years they’ve vigorously ignored any and all scandals.

Case in point is the $15 billion giveaway that Biden-Harris snuck through this summer without a single hearing, vote, or advance notice, in an attempt to buy seniors’ votes. Followed up by a campaign email to these same seniors on behalf of Kamala Harris, also paid for by taxpayers.

Is any of this legal? Who cares, if it helps Harris win in November? At least, that’s how the mainstream press is treating this scandal.

Here’s the background.

The criminally misnamed “Inflation Reduction Act” that Joe Biden signed on Aug. 16, 2022, after Harris cast the tie-breaking vote, including among its many horrid provisions, several that affected Medicare Part D – the drug benefit for seniors – is set to go into effect in 2025.

Biden and now Harris have been running around claiming that this was a tremendous deal for seniors, except those provisions added huge costs to these drug plans that were going to jack up monthly premiums for this benefit by an average of $110 – a 179% increase!

So, to avoid that, the administration conjured up a “demonstration project” whereby insurance companies would agree to hold monthly premium increases to $35 or less in exchange for a pile of cash.

The Congressional Budget Office figures this will cost $5 billion a year – in borrowed money – plus another $2 billion a year in added interest costs on the national debt.

Critics have pointed out that this wasn’t a “demonstration project,” normally understood as a small-scale effort to test a change in rules governing a program. Instead, it was a subsidy handed out to every insurance company offering Part D plans.

“Effectively, the Biden administration is forcibly keeping Part D premiums artificially ‘stable’ on the taxpayer’s dime,” notes the American Action Forum’s John Walker.

House Republicans described it as “an unchecked taxpayer-funded bailout to paper over the flaws in the Inflation Reduction Act.”

There’s a simpler way to describe it. A vote-buying scam.

One that is probably illegal and that would be treated as a major scandal if a Republican president tried to do something like this in an election year.

But wait, there’s more.

Just weeks ago, HHS sent an email signed by Biden to seniors enrolled in Medicare touting all the great things that Biden and Harris were doing to save them money.

“I want to make sure you’re aware of the historic changes to Medicare that are lowering health care costs,” it begins, that are “a result of the Inflation Reduction Act that I signed into law and that Vice President Harris cast the tie-breaking vote to secure.” It goes on to say that “these are just some of the ways my administration has worked to help you save money on your health care costs.”

(No mention is made of the $15 billion they’re planning to spend to make budget-shattering premium increases.)

The letter is flagrant electioneering, paid for by taxpayers, and in clear violation of the Hatch Act, which outlaws the use of federal staff or resources “for the purpose of interfering with or affecting the result of an election.”

Last week, the Foundation for Accountability and Civic Trust filed a complaint with the U.S. Office of Special Counsel saying that the email “was entirely political in both its purpose and language,” and “has been described as ‘a sales pitch for Kamala Harris.’”

All of this has been blissfully ignored by the mainstream press, which is more interested in wringing out every last ounce of news value about an off-color joke told at a Trump rally.

But it is perfectly in keeping with how Washington works these days. Democrats squander taxpayer money to protect their power and positions. The press ignores it. And the people who call attention to the graft and corruption are called fascists.