In a column in the wake of Michigan Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed’s disastrous appearance on NBC’s Meet the Press on Sunday, Aug. 9, I touched on his inability to honestly address questions centered on his own “Medicare for All” campaign platform.
“One of El-Sayed’s signature issues is 'Medicare for All.' It’s an issue that El-Sayed loves to mention but doesn’t like to talk about in detail. One reason is that it’s not good for sound bites. Once you get into the details of Medicare, it gets complex, bureaucratic, and boring. None of those things work well in media interviews,” I wrote.
El-Sayed’s full non-answer is here.
🚨 HOLY CRAP! In a stunning moment, Michigan Senate candidate Abdulrahman Mohamed El Sayed (D) says the middle class will pay MORE TAXES under his socialist healthcare program
— Eric Daugherty (@EricLDaugh) August 9, 2026
"It would be free at the POINT OF CARE."
"That's a trade worth making."
WELKER: You are acknowledging… pic.twitter.com/Nv5rvdkvwy
At the same time, El-Sayed wants voters to believe that there is some magic to Medicare, where all you need to do is pay a little more to the government, and you won’t have to deal with those pesky private insurance companies anymore. You know, the ones that make some people rich and allow you to have an X-ray sometime this year.
More to the point, what he doesn’t want you to focus on are the realities of Medicare itself. In a sense, this is a tactical mistake for El-Sayed, because roughly 2.2 million people in Michigan alone are already on Medicare. They know how it works, and they know firsthand what El-Sayed is not saying about its costs and limitations. And that doesn't even include how much more you'd have to pay in taxes to provide Medicare to the entire U.S. population.
For comparison, back when Barack Obama was selling “Obamacare,” it was just an idea. Voters had nothing to compare it to. But in this case, El-Sayed is painting his vision of “Medicare for All” as something akin to landing in paradise with 72 virgins. Sadly, for El-Sayed, millions of Americans already know from experience it falls well short of that.
In my piece, I mentioned some things that generated some insightful responses from you, our loyal and intelligent readers. Here’s what I wrote:
Something that rarely comes up when ‘Medicare for All’ is discussed is what Medicare does not cover. Anyone who’s turned 65 and applied for Medicare knows that Medicare is hardly an apples-to-apples replacement for the kind of health insurance you may have gotten through your employer.
Medicare does not automatically include eye care, dental care, and certain prescription coverage. If retirees pay more, and most do, they can enroll in a Part C or Medicare Advantage plan that covers more. But even there, Medicare Advantage is only one option and may not be as good as your existing health insurance. Some opt not to go with Medicare Advantage, instead going with a more expensive Medigap or another alternative plan that they feel is closer to what they're used to.
That seemed to generate quite the response in our comments section from PJ Media readers who provided real-world examples that pretty much destroyed El-Sayed’s “Medicare for All” narrative.
anon-megv commented: “I had BlueCross BlueShield while working and kept a version of it when I retired and went on Medicare. I am very glad I did, but it is not free.”
anon-k04g wrote: “I'm retired, have Medicare through Social Security and pay $228 monthly for it. Pay about $250 a month for Medicare supplemental insurance. That's just medical. Then there's the $40 a month for dental which covers very little (2 cleanings per year). AND a small amount monthly for prescription coverage. And I still pay a share of medical procedures. So don't tell me Medicare for all is a good deal. It's just big government BS. Oh yeah, fed income tax is taken off the top of your social security check.”
nomo chimed in: “Now that I am not working anymore and am forced to medicare because of my age, my "healthcare" costs me $202 a month and does not cover s**t, even with my so called advantage plan. I paid $196 a month for a plan through my employer that covered more than I could have imagined and my wife was covered as well. Shove medicare for all.”
Judge Smails wrote: “No physician will even spend six minutes in the exam room because I use Medicare. We go through this routine with every democrat candidate about Medicare for all. They were demanding it in the year 2000, and they have never stopped going to that talking point since then.”
Isaiah53_5 commented: “What Sayed doesn’t mention is Medicare recipients pay a monthly premium. It’s about $200 a month (paid quarterly). There’s added monthly costs based on your income. So Medicare is not free. In addition, a serious advocate for Medicare for All would know by how much Medicare taxes need go up to cover healthcare costs for the millions added. He’s full of crap by saying people would pay 'a little more' in taxes to cover the cost. Remember, people pay into Medicare for decades before becoming eligible to receive healthcare through it. Medicare for All makes people eligible for coverage from birth.”
Recommended: Clean Up in Aisle 4! Abdul El-Sayed Makes a Mess on ‘Meet the Press’
I’m sure this just scratches the surface of what so many of our readers are experiencing first-hand with Medicare. If you’re interested, let’s continue this dialogue and expose El-Sayed's empty promises for what they are. Go down to the comments section and share your Medicare stories. Then let’s see if El-Sayed’s vision of a “Medicare for All” utopia measures up, or if it’s just another destructive Democrat idea that will grab more money from American taxpayers’ wallets without giving them the kind of healthcare they deserve.
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