Nicolai Haugsted
Trump’s latest payment plan will put $90 directly into the hands of millions of Medicare recipients.
Millions of older Americans are (allegedly) about to find an extra $90 in their bank accounts — and the timing puts the payments squarely in the middle of a heated election season.
According to Reuters, president Donald Trump has announced that the federal government will make one-time payments to more than 20 million Medicare recipients, with the money intended to offset part of the cost of their Medicare Part B premiums.
Most eligible recipients will not have to wait long. Payments are scheduled to arrive in early October, just weeks before Americans vote in the November midterm elections.
More than 20 million people are eligible
The White House says the $90 payments will come from the Medicare Improvement Fund, which Congress has provided with $2 billion for improvements to the traditional Medicare fee-for-service program.
Most eligible recipients with direct deposit will automatically receive $90 in their bank accounts.
People without direct deposit will instead receive a check at the mailing address registered with Medicare.
Eligibility does not extend to every Medicare recipient.
Most people enrolled in Medicare Part B qualify, according to the White House, but recipients whose premiums are already paid by Medicaid will not. People paying an Income-Related Monthly Adjustment Amount because of higher income are also excluded.
$90 will cover only part of the monthly premium
Trump described the initiative as a way to help seniors with their Medicare premiums.
For individual recipients, however, the payment represents a relatively modest one-off contribution rather than an ongoing reduction in healthcare costs.
The administration says the Medicare Improvement Fund was created in 2008 and has never previously been used to make direct payments of this kind to beneficiaries.
Seniors uncertain about whether they qualify can contact Medicare, while questions about the status of an individual payment are being handled by the Social Security Administration.
Another payment arrives before the midterms
Political timing gives the announcement another dimension.
Trump unveiled the Medicare payments roughly a month before the November midterm elections, when Republicans will try to retain their majorities in the House and Senate.
The $90 payment is also far from the only recent administration initiative putting government money directly into Americans’ hands.
Nearly one million people are separately receiving $500 payments under what the White House calls the Working Families Obamacare Refund. The administration says those payments return surplus fees collected through the federal Affordable Care Act marketplace. Checks began going out in October.
Trump has also proposed a considerably larger idea: $5,000 payments to adult Americans if Republicans retain control of Congress, according to Reuters. Unlike the Medicare payment, that proposal would require additional steps before becoming reality and has faced skepticism over its cost and feasibility.
