Federal law requires the Medicare Trustees to issue a funding warning in their annual report whenever they project that Medicare’s dedicated revenues will fall significantly short of its outlays within seven years. They have issued such a warning, known as a “Medicare Trigger,” every year since 2006.
The president, in turn, is required by law to take action whenever the trustees issue a Medicare Trigger two years in a row. The White House must submit to Congress proposed legislation to address the projected funding crisis. President Bush followed the law by submitting a plan in 2008, though Congress never voted on it.
President Obama has taken a different approach: He has ignored the law altogether. The Medicare Trustees continue to warn us every year, and yet for the past three years we have received no proposal from the Obama administration.
His voice and those of his fellow elected Democrats are missing from this debate. We have heard from bipartisan groups like Domenici-Rivlin and the president’s own debt commission. We have heard from Rep. Paul Ryan and the vast majority of Republicans who have voted for his plan.
But Republicans can’t reform Medicare alone, and we won’t negotiate against ourselves. We need the president to lead. And we need the president to follow the law.
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