March 7, 2017

Jason Chaffetz Tells Poor Americans to Choose Between iPhones and Health Care

The condescension was palpable.


While promoting the details of a new Republican proposal to replace the Affordable Care Act, Rep. Jason Chaffetz (R-Utah) advised low-income Americans to resist purchasing new iPhones and prioritize purchasing health care coverage instead. The remarks came as Chaffetz defended the plan’s elimination of the individual mandate, which Obamacare proponents have long maintained is crucial to keeping health care costs down for the people who need it the most.

“Americans have choices—and they’ve got to make a choice,” Chaffetz said during an appearance on CNN’s New Day on Tuesday morning. “So maybe rather than getting that new iPhone that they just love and they want to go spend hundreds of dollars on that, maybe they should invest in their own health care.”

“They’ve got to make those decisions themselves,” he continued.

Chaffetz’s recommendation on Tuesday is consistent with the long-held belief among many conservatives that poor people don’t manage their money well and therefore require strict restrictions on what they can buy using government food aid, for example. Such views persist despite evidence that poor people are no more likely to buy the groceries that conservatives want to limit, such as soda and other sugary foods, than people who don’t receive federal aid.

Chaffetz later appeared to walk back his iPhone comment, telling Fox News it did not come out as “smoothly” as he intended.

WE CAME UP SHORT.

We just wrapped up a shorter-than-normal, urgent-as-ever fundraising drive and we came up about $45,000 short of our $300,000 goal.

That means we're going to have upwards of $350,000, maybe more, to raise in online donations between now and June 30, when our fiscal year ends and we have to get to break-even. And even though there's zero cushion to miss the mark, we won't be all that in your face about our fundraising again until June.

So we urgently need this specific ask, what you're reading right now, to start bringing in more donations than it ever has. The reality, for these next few months and next few years, is that we have to start finding ways to grow our online supporter base in a big way—and we're optimistic we can keep making real headway by being real with you about this.

Because the bottom line: Corporations and powerful people with deep pockets will never sustain the type of journalism Mother Jones exists to do. The only investors who won’t let independent, investigative journalism down are the people who actually care about its future—you.

And we hope you might consider pitching in before moving on to whatever it is you're about to do next. We really need to see if we'll be able to raise more with this real estate on a daily basis than we have been, so we're hoping to see a promising start.

payment methods

WE CAME UP SHORT.

We just wrapped up a shorter-than-normal, urgent-as-ever fundraising drive and we came up about $45,000 short of our $300,000 goal.

That means we're going to have upwards of $350,000, maybe more, to raise in online donations between now and June 30, when our fiscal year ends and we have to get to break-even. And even though there's zero cushion to miss the mark, we won't be all that in your face about our fundraising again until June.

So we urgently need this specific ask, what you're reading right now, to start bringing in more donations than it ever has. The reality, for these next few months and next few years, is that we have to start finding ways to grow our online supporter base in a big way—and we're optimistic we can keep making real headway by being real with you about this.

Because the bottom line: Corporations and powerful people with deep pockets will never sustain the type of journalism Mother Jones exists to do. The only investors who won’t let independent, investigative journalism down are the people who actually care about its future—you.

And we hope you might consider pitching in before moving on to whatever it is you're about to do next. We really need to see if we'll be able to raise more with this real estate on a daily basis than we have been, so we're hoping to see a promising start.

payment methods

We Recommend

Latest

Sign up for our free newsletter

Subscribe to the Mother Jones Daily to have our top stories delivered directly to your inbox.

Get our award-winning magazine

Save big on a full year of investigations, ideas, and insights.

Subscribe

Support our journalism

Help Mother Jones' reporters dig deep with a tax-deductible donation.

Donate