CONCORD – House Speaker William O’Brien (R-Mont Vernon) and House Commerce and Consumer Affairs Chairman John Hunt (R-Rindge) today condemned factually inaccurate statements made by Democrat candidate for Governor Maggie Hassan and the New Hampshire Democrat Party that Speaker O’Brien supported legislation (HB 1560) to have the state run Medicare, the health insurance program for seniors. At a debate at New England College Thursday, Maggie Hassan stated that Speaker O’Brien supported this legislation, a charge repeated by the NHDP in an email to supporters Friday.
House Speaker William O’Brien
“The Democrats’ War on Facts has now hit a depressing, but unsurprising, new low. Clearly, Maggie Hassan and Ray Buckley feel confident promoting lies made out of whole cloth, confident that the state’s media has been and will be disinclined to hold them accountable for their reckless mistruths. In the real world, the world were the statements by Hassan and Buckley are lies, I was the one who asked Chairman Hunt to turn this legislation to a study committee for the purpose of salvaging the portion of the bill I strongly supported – turning federal Medicaid payments into a block grant – and removing the part of the bill I didn’t support – asking the states to accept the responsibility for Medicare’s massive unfunded liability. I was clear then, and I believe now, that it makes no sense to ask state taxpayers to take on Medicare’s hole of between $38-43 TRILLION in obligations, which is even larger than the liability for Social Security. However, it is also clear that Democrats have no use for facts and will simply make up whatever story suits them on any given day. Just as they showed in the prior two legislative terms that they cannot be trusted with running government, throughout Hassan’s campaign, she and Buckley have shown they can’t be trusted to tell the truth.”
House Commerce Chairman John Hunt
“The Speaker clearly expressed a great deal of concern over the state taking on the liability of Medicare and suggested that we needed to put a great deal of study into any effort to do so. At the same time, he is a strong advocate for block grants for Medicaid. His concern was a big reason why the Commerce Committee recommended that the Health Care Compact bill be turned into a study committee. For the Democrats to suggest that Speaker O’Brien was a supporter of the state taking over Medicare is simply 100% inaccurate and irresponsible.”