{"id":1794,"date":"2023-09-28T16:18:32","date_gmt":"2023-09-28T16:18:32","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/healthynewsusa.com\/?p=1794"},"modified":"2023-09-28T16:18:35","modified_gmt":"2023-09-28T16:18:35","slug":"gop-presidential-primary-debate-no-2-an-angry-rematch-and-the-same-notable-no-show","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/healthynewsusa.com\/?p=1794","title":{"rendered":"GOP Presidential Primary Debate No. 2: An Angry Rematch and the Same Notable No-Show"},"content":{"rendered":"
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From the start of the second Republican presidential primary debate of the 2024 campaign, the seven candidates on stage were boisterous and unruly.<\/p>\n

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley, South Carolina Sen. Tim Scott, entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy, former Vice President Mike Pence, former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, and North Dakota Gov. Doug Burgum spent most of the evening talking loudly over \u2014 and sometimes quite angrily at \u2014 one another.<\/p>\n

The moderators \u2014 Fox News\u2019 Dana Perino, Fox Business\u2019 Stuart Varney, and Univision\u2019s Ilia Calder\u00f3n \u2014 sometimes struggled to referee at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library & Museum in Simi Valley, California, as the presidential hopefuls clashed on topics ranging from the autoworkers\u2019 strike to foreign policy. At points, health care issues crept into the discussion.<\/p>\n

Our PolitiFact<\/a> partners fact-checked the candidates in real time. You can read their full coverage here<\/a>.<\/p>\n

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Candidates sparred over manufacturing and employment, inflation, and federal spending. When it came to the government shutdown threat, Haley promised to change the process, pointing out that Congress had delivered appropriations on schedule only four times in 40 years.<\/p>\n

Asked about medical debt<\/a>, which plagues tens of millions of Americans, she pledged a multipronged effort to protect people from financial ruin when they need care. She spoke of introducing more competition in the health system and putting \u201cthe patient in the driver\u2019s seat\u201d while increasing transparency.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re going to have to make every part of the industry open up and show us where the warts are,\u201d she said. She didn\u2019t elaborate on how that could be accomplished.<\/p>\n

Pence dodged a question about whether he would make good on his promise, from 2016 and the current campaign, to repeal the Affordable Care Act \u2014 also known as Obamacare \u2014 which Perino noted seemed more popular now than ever.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s my intention,\u201d the former vice president said, \u201cto make the federal government smaller by returning to the states those resources and programs that are rightfully theirs under the 10th Amendment of the Constitution.\u201d That would include all Obamacare and Health and Human Services funding, he said.<\/p>\n

Pence also said he is \u201csick and tired\u201d of mass shootings and promised, if elected, to advance an expedited federal death penalty \u201cfor anyone involved in a mass shooting\u201d so they \u201cmeet their fate in months, not years.\u201d The former vice president criticized DeSantis over the sentence handed down to a gunman who attacked Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida, in 2018, calling it \u201cunconscionable\u201d that he\u2019ll \u201cspend the rest of his life behind bars.\u201d<\/p>\n

On the issue of health insurance coverage, DeSantis wore his state\u2019s high uninsurance rate as a badge of honor.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou can do well in the state, but we\u2019re not going to be like California and have massive numbers of people on government programs without work requirements,\u201d he said. Under DeSantis, Florida is one of just 10 states<\/a> that have declined to take advantage of federal funding available under Obamacare to expand Medicaid, the program that covers low-income Americans.<\/p>\n

Throughout the evening, the candidates sometimes invoked Reagan\u2019s name and memory. He wasn\u2019t the only former president not in attendance but often mentioned. Donald Trump, who enjoys a commanding lead<\/a> in the polls, opted again to steer clear of the debate stage.<\/p>\n

\u201cDonald, I know you are watching \u2014 you can\u2019t help yourself,\u201d Christie said early on. He said Trump avoided the event because he was \u201cafraid\u201d of \u201cbeing on the stage\u201d and defending his record.<\/p>\n

Trump told Fox News Digital<\/a> in an interview after the debate that he hadn\u2019t watched it.<\/p>\n

Former Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson did not meet the Republican National Committee\u2019s donor and polling thresholds to participate. Former Texas Rep. Will Hurd also did not qualify.<\/p>\n

Here are last night\u2019s health-related claims checked by PolitiFact:<\/p>\n

Ron DeSantis: 2.6 million Floridians going without health insurance \u201cis a symptom of our overall economic decline.\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n

When moderator Varney pressed DeSantis on the relatively high number of Floridians without health insurance \u2014 Varney said it\u2019s 2.6 million \u2014 DeSantis blamed politicians in Washington, D.C.<\/p>\n

But the numbers from DeSantis\u2019 own state health department show no correlation between economic conditions and the number of Floridians without health insurance. Despite population growth and economic changes, Florida had about 2.6 million uninsured residents from 2018 through 2021, and about 2.4 million in 2022.<\/p>\n

In 2022, Florida\u2019s uninsured rate was 11.2%, higher than the 8% national rate<\/a>, according to the U.S. Census Bureau.<\/p>\n

Vivek Ramaswamy: \u201cTransgenderism, especially in kids, is a mental health disorder.\u201d\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

Medical experts disagree<\/a>. Being transgender and having gender dysphoria \u2014 the distress that some people may experience when their sex assigned at birth does not align with their gender identity \u2014 is not considered a mental health disorder. Historically, the diagnosis has carried the term \u201cdisorder,\u201d but experts no longer view it as a pathology and are working to destigmatize the diagnosis.<\/p>\n

Previous terms such as \u201cgender identity disorder\u201d and \u201ctransexualism\u201d have evolved into \u201cgender incongruence,\u201d a condition the World Health Organization now considers a condition related to sexual health \u2014 not mental health. The American Psychiatric Association\u2019s \u201cDiagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders,\u201d or DSM-5, contains a diagnosis for \u201cgender dysphoria,\u201d but experts say it remains partly to let insurance companies cover gender-affirming care and let incarcerated people access care.<\/p>\n

Mike Pence: Linn-Mar Community School District in Iowa had a policy where \u201cyou could get a gender transition plan without notifying your parents.\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n

This needs more context<\/a>. The Iowa school district outside Cedar Rapids in 2022 adopted a policy<\/a> that allowed students to request a \u201cgender support plan.\u201d According to Axios<\/a>, this plan would outline a student\u2019s preferred name and pronouns as well as which locker rooms or bathroom the student would use, which is associated with a social, rather than a medical, transition.<\/p>\n

The student could choose whether the parents were informed, but the plan was not related to medical transition, which, for minors, requires the consent of parental guardians. Schools often don\u2019t inform parents when students signal they are socially transitioning, The Washington Post reported<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Tim Scott: The southwestern U.S. border under President Joe Biden is \u201cunsafe, wide-open, and insecure, leading to the deaths of 70,000 Americans in the last 12 months because of fentanyl.\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n

Scott\u2019s claim is misleading<\/a>. Deaths from fentanyl jumped 23% in Biden\u2019s first year in office to more than 70,000. But they have been increasing since 2014 and also rose during the Trump administration.<\/p>\n

Although immigration encounters at the southern U.S. border have spiked under Biden\u2019s watch, most of the fentanyl coming into the U.S. from Mexico reportedly comes through legal ports of entry. The vast majority of people sentenced for fentanyl trafficking are U.S. citizens, federal data shows.<\/p>\n