Co-host Alex Wagner asked Mulvaney about people who do not live in a state that requires maternity coverage.”Then you can figure out a way to change the state that you live in,” Mulvaney replied.Wagner asked if Mulvaney meant that people should move.“No, they can try to change their own state legislatures and their state laws,” he responded. “Why do we look to the federal government to try and fix our local problems?”
Oh, I see. As far as the White House is concerned, American women shouldn’t have the guarantee of maternity care; American women in blue states should have the guarantee of maternity care.Access to prescription medication, maternity care, pediatric care, preventive care, and substance-abuse treatments are, according to Trump’s OMB chief, “local problems,” not issues worthy of national concern.If you live in a state in which lawmakers don’t like interfering with private insurance companies, you can (a) move; (b) find time to start lobbying state policymakers in the hopes of persuading them; or (c) go without treatments.This, according to a leading voice on Team Trump, is the White House’s preferred model.The Republican plan is already woefully unpopular, but given new GOP efforts to make the bill even more right-wing, there’s no reason to believe its public support can’t deteriorate further.
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Steve Benen is a producer for "The Rachel Maddow Show," the editor of MaddowBlog and an MS NOW political contributor. He's also the bestselling author of "Ministry of Truth: Democracy, Reality, and the Republicans' War on the Recent Past."