The Congressional Progressive Caucus released its legislative priorities last week, but noticeably absent from its described plan to “rebuild the American dream for the poor, working, and middle class” should Democrats win in 2024 was a longtime centerpiece of the progressive agenda: “Medicare for All.”
But progressive lawmakers and grassroots leaders who have championed Medicare for All saw its exclusion as a largely pragmatic move by CPC’s chair, Rep. Pramila Jayapal. Even Sen. Bernie Sanders, who popularized the single-payer health care proposal during his 2016 presidential run, said he was surprised but understood the omission.
“I don’t know what the [CPC’s] motives are. I think maybe they were thinking of a more short-term agenda rather than long-term, but I don’t know,” Sanders told NOTUS. “We’re clearly in a broken and dysfunctional health care system, which is the most expensive and wasteful in the world. Clearly, clearly, we need to move for Medicare for All.”