Trump weighs major gift to for-profit insurance indus​try: Medicare privatization

[turbinetree]

By Jake Johnson, Common Dreams
Published April 10, 2026 3:53 PM ET

The Trump administration is considering enacting a policy that would automatically funnel seniors into for-profit Medicare Advantage plans—which critics say would set Medicare on the path to full-scale privatization.

Chris Klomp, the Trump administration’s director of Medicare and deputy administrator of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS), told STAT last month that enrolling seniors in Medicare Advantage (MA) plans by default “is something that we’re thinking through.” MA plans are funded by the federal government and run by private insurance companies such as UnitedHealthcare and Humana, both of which have been accused of improperly denying necessary care to patients and overcharging taxpayers.

The default enrollment scheme was floated in the far-right Project 2025 agenda that President Donald Trump has repeatedly tried to disavow. Currently, older Americans who have received Social Security benefits for at least four months before they turn 65 are automatically enrolled in traditional Medicare, and they can choose to enroll in an MA plan as an alternative.

https://www.rawstory.com/trump-medicare/

Now happening..............they can try, but it will not happen.................right now over 26 million people have no health insurance and there is a current maga congress that just threw people off health coverage and if you think they will not do it with this BS................come out from under your rock............

https://www.kff.org/uninsured/key-facts-about-the-uninsured-population/

[bucolic_frolic]

1. The whole retirement system will be in play before you know it

SS in its initial form was supposed to provide the basics to all. Now retirees mirror the whole population, poor/middleclass/rich. Some have assets, some have little, some have a lot.

Do you go broke sooner, or later? Do you leave something behind, or not?

The real losers are those who die early in retirement, or don't make it to retirement. MA plans delay the financial pain, maybe you need the coverage, maybe not. Medigap offer the highest coverage - for early and recurrent monthly payments. Again, the more you put in, the more is available to you.

The idea Congress or SSA can even out the bumps, inequities, availability is just ludicrous. Take the system of winners and losers and make it all fair, while private insurance is after the profits, Wall Street is after SS, the government taxes you. And it will be so complex you will need to study it 9 months a year to understand what is going on.