The Number of Uninsured Keeps Going Up Under Donald Trump

I see via the Washington Post that the Census Bureau has released its latest estimate of the uninsured population in the United States through 2019. Here it is:

The number of uninsured dropped steadily through 2016 but has risen slowly ever since Donald Trump took office. Let’s compare this to the CDC’s survey, which has always been my go-to source for the most accurate numbers. I haven’t checked in with them for a while, so here’s the latest, including the first quarter of 2020:

This tells roughly the same story. The data is a little bit noisier since the CDC reports quarterly, and it shows that the increase started around 2018. Either way, it appears that Trump’s effort to seed chaos in the Obamacare signup process had a modest success. The net increase in the uninsured comes to a little more than 1 percent, which represents about 3 million fewer people with health coverage. Nice work, Donald.

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“Lying.” “Disgusting.” “Scum.” “Slime.” “Corrupt.” “Enemy of the people.” Donald Trump has always made clear what he thinks of journalists. And it’s plain now that his administration intends to do everything it can to stop journalists from reporting things they don’t like—which is most things that are true.

No one gets to tell Mother Jones what to publish or not publish, because no one owns our fiercely independent newsroom. But that also means we need to directly raise the resources it takes to keep our journalism alive. There’s only one way for that to happen, and it’s readers like you stepping up. Please help with a donation today if you can—even a few bucks will make a real difference. A monthly gift would be incredible.

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