Source: United States Senator for Kansas Roger Marshall
Senator Marshall Joins The Joe Pags Show to Discuss DNI’s Russia Report
Washington – On Wednesday, U.S. Senator Roger Marshall, M.D. (R-Kansas), joined Joe Pags on the Joe Pags Show to discuss Medicaid and rural hospitals, the MAHA agenda, what needs to be done to help improve American healthcare outcomes, and what will happen to the perpetrators identified in DNI Tulsi Gabbard’s recent report about the Russia misinformation scandal.
Click HERE or on the image above to watch Senator Marshall’s full interview.
On the challenges facing rural hospitals:
“This is one of my favorite topics. You know, I practiced medicine for 25 years in one of these rural hospitals. I helped run the hospital, delivered a baby every day in one of these hospitals for 25 years. You know, the challenge right now for rural hospitals is the rural economy. We have many counties that have lost half their population. They’re all moving to big, wonderful cities like Kansas City and Wichita. So the rural economy is really struggling. Only 5% of Medicaid dollars ever make it to rural America. So yes, 60% of rural hospitals are really struggling.
And enter the One Big, Beautiful Bill – we try to help the rural economy by helping out with crop insurance, reference prices, doubling the death tax, and some of those types of business tax issues as well. So I think it’s the economy, right?”
On Democrat misinformation regarding Medicaid and rural hospitals:“Joe, I think the left controls 90% of the message. They control the national media; it is that simple. But I came to Washington, DC, to save healthcare, and I think that we’ve saved Medicaid. For now, we’ve saved it. We put it back on solid financial footing so that Medicaid is there for those who need it the most. For senior citizens in nursing homes, for people with disabilities, for pregnant women, for children.
“No one’s going to lose Medicaid unless they’re on it illegally, and there are 2 million people on it illegally right now. 2 million people getting it from two states right now. And then, the only other people that will lose their Medicaid are people that refuse to work. And all we’re asking is people work for 20 hours a week. When did having a job, when was that considered punishment? Why is that a bad thing?
“I’m going to give you one more stat, Joe, is that 20 years ago, there was only 7 million healthy people on Medicaid. Today, there’s 34 million healthy people on Medicaid. Let’s help those people find a job. Let’s give them education. Let’s help give them a hand up, and not a handout.”
On the importance of verifying people’s status for Medicaid:
“So this would be Medicaid expansion as you know it. So, Medicaid expansion gives Medicaid to healthy people that are above the poverty line. And then they stopped really doing any types of checks and balances on people. People could just walk in and say, I don’t have a job, I’m not making any money, they would never verify it. But we had the technology data actually verify those things pretty easily, and then we would just check things once a year. So I understand, look, I want to help medicate people out, I want to make sure no one goes to bed hungry, but this idea of just checking people once a year, not verifying their story, is just dishonest.”
On improving the quality of VA care:
“So Joe, again, what’s important to me: my dad served, my brother served, I served, my son is serving everyone. Every generation of my family, someone has served. I want to make sure that we fulfill the promise we made to veterans, but it’s been done inefficiently. It’s amazing, when President Trump 45 was in office, the wait times went down for our veterans, the care was going up, and the patient satisfaction was going up.
“But under Joe Biden, they hired more and more administrator-type of people. And now President Trump went in there and said, ‘we don’t want all this bloated administration.’ There’s hundreds of billions of dollars that we’re increasing every year for veterans. We want to make sure it’s patient interfacing. So it’s the counselors, it’s the nurses, it’s the physical therapists. Those are the people we want. We don’t want more and more bureaucrats setting up here in the VA, here in Washington, DC.”
On what might replace Obamacare:
“Absolutely, and we’ve had these conversations. My big three themes for fixing health care when I came here was anything that makes health care more transparent, anything that promotes innovation, and anything that makes patients consumers again, would drive down the cost of health care. And President Trump already has issued many executive orders on the transparency part of this that are coming to fruition as well… making hospitals show you what they’re going to charge you for if you need an MRI, make that imaging center share with you what it’s going to cost so consumers can shop more.
“So our big thrust of legislation this semester, as I call it, is we dropped a big transparency bill, which in many cases is codifying what President Trump’s executive orders are. And then there’s an issue called prior authorization, where Medicare Advantage companies, especially, are trying to prevent patients from getting the care they need.
“So I was recently with the White House and Dr. Oz, and Secretary Kennedy, putting some more rules around what they can and can’t do as far as withholding health care. So, absolutely, those conversations that went on since day one, and I’m very proud to work beside Dr. Oz, Dr. McCary, over in FDA, as well as Secretary Kennedy.”
On healthcare cost transparency and medical monopolies:
“Joe, I’m not sure if I have a great answer. I can certainly tell you that I believe that insurance companies and big hospitals wrote the ACA. And they knew exactly what they were doing. Through the years, increased regulations have led to monopolies. So, you think about healthcare in each community. There’s one hospital; there’s usually one or two insurance companies that control 80% of the market in the entire state as well. So, through the years, these monopolies have allowed them to do it more.
“So, physicians would like to own hospitals. Hospitals can own physicians, but physicians cannot own hospitals. We would like to come back in and have more competition, but that was outlawed by the ACA as well. So, whenever there’s overregulation, that’s going to lead to consolidation of the industry and get them more and more free rein.”
On the job that HHS Secretary Kennedy is doing thus far:
“Well, I think we’re just getting started again. The backdrop of this is 60% of Americans have a chronic disease. We’re spending 90% of our healthcare dollars on those chronic diseases, think heart disease, hypertension, obesity, diabetes, Alzheimer’s, cancer, and anxiety. Those seven diseases are taking up 90% of [the] dollars [spent]. We think that there’s a significant nutritional component to all those. I think that we’re going to find that alzheimers is type three diabetes.
“So, what can we do nutritionally to prevent those as well as treat them. So I’ve worked, obviously, I’ve grown up in agriculture, so I’ve had a foot in agriculture my whole life, a foot in healthcare since I was 23 or so, I started medical school, I guess.
“So, as I listened to MAHA, I listened to the American farmers, and said: Where do we meet? How do we get healthy food? Well, I think it starts with healthy soil. It’s kind of a dirty topic, if you will, but that’s the focus. That’s what we’re working with, Secretary Kennedy and Secretary Rollins at Agriculture, who’s doing an incredible job, is trying to work with our farmers to make healthier soil, which is going to lead to healthy food and healthy people. And by the way, American farmers are doing so many great things already in this area.
“So, I’ve been sharing with Secretary Kennedy best practices where we’re growing more with less. We’re decreasing by 90% the amount of fertilizer and pesticides that are leaving our field. We’re decreasing the amount that we’re putting on by 60% through modern-day agriculture practices. So, we’re working on this transition to get everybody practicing this regenerative agriculture.”
On DNI Gabbard’s Russia misinformation report:
“Joe, this is certainly new information to me. This White House meeting, with documentation of that meeting, adds Joe Biden’s name to being in that meeting as well. And I think what that document shows is this is the greatest betrayal of American trust in my lifetime. And you’re out there, your listeners right now, you’re sitting there thinking, well, the Democrats lied to us about COVID. They lied to us about Joe Biden’s health. And here’s his Royal Highness Barack Obama, that he lied to us as well and really organized this fraud, of what happened in this, Russia, Russia, Russia hoax.
“And certainly the FISA court abuse, we knew all about that, but this is news to me that we can actually trace this all the way back to it to one Oval Office meeting, and they absolutely contradicted what the intelligence community was saying. I think that’s accurate.”
On what will happen to the perpetrators of the hoax:
“Yeah, Joe, I think it’s all the above. Certainly, we need the Justice Department to go full speed ahead and do whatever they can do. And meanwhile, the House and the Senate both have investigative committees. James Comer leads that over on the House side, and Rand Paul here on the Senate side. Ron Johnson also has a subcommittee that can focus on this as well. So, all of this needs to happen. Congress’s job is to expose everything and then let the Justice Department prosecute.
“But regardless of where it goes, Joe, I think the story here, to me, is this betrayal of American trust as a physician. One of the first things I learned is that once you lose your reputation, you never get it back. And Americans don’t trust the federal government right now, and why would they right? So, I’m trying to work day and night to help restore that trust, but I think the Democrats just keep digging and digging a hole further and deeper. You know, the first thing you need to do when you’re in a hole is to stop digging. And here they are again, once again, in a deep, deep hole.”
On the American right wanting to see arrests:
“Joe, I sure hope so. I just want to tell you, you sound like my wife. You sound like my mom and dad. They say why isn’t somebody in handcuffs? Everything Hillary Clinton did to erase those emails. And the FISA court abuse. I’m not satisfied. You know, the judges should have paid the price for that. Everyone involved in that food chain of the FISA court abuse should have been fired at a minimum. And maybe one person went to jail, as I recall that.
“So here we are. This is the next chapter of the FISA court abuse, and I think that’s what gives this story legs is… you dove into that story. I dove into that story, saying, my gosh, how did they do this? How did they fall for this, I mean, without orchestrating it? I sure hope so. I’m not a person to overpromise and underdeliver. I do think that Pam Bondi is serious. She would love to throw someone in jail. And I have a feeling Tulsi Gabbard would as well.”