The following is an edited transcript excerpt from <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/episode/ep-1917-assassin-storms-mar-a-lago-to-try-to-kill-president-trump">The Michael Knowles Show</a>.
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One of the most common talking points you hear from the Left — and you’re going to hear it a lot heading into the midterms — is that America has terrible health care. We’re told that every civilized country in the world has universal, socialized medicine, and that we’re backward, retrograde, clinging to some barbaric capitalist system while enlightened Europeans enjoy cradle-to-grave care.
You hear it constantly: America is a disgrace. We need socialized medicine.
Now, before we go any further, let’s acknowledge something the Left rarely does: we already have a substantial amount of socialized medicine in this country. We have it for illegal aliens. We have it for the very poor. We have it for the elderly through Medicare. We have a massive social safety net.
But here’s the part they leave out: the only reason any of that works at all is because it’s sitting on top of a heavily capitalist health care system that funds the entire apparatus. The “free” part only functions because something productive underneath it is paying the bills.
Still, we’re told we should scrap the whole thing and go full European.
How about we take a little look at some of the socialist health care systems around the world? Let&#8217;s start with Europe.
<h3><a href="https://www.dailywire.com/episode/ep-1917-assassin-storms-mar-a-lago-to-try-to-kill-president-trump">WATCH: The Michael Knowles Show on DailyWire+</a></h3>
A horrifying story recently came out of the United Kingdom. According to <a href="https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-15582277/Woman-dead-floor-home-told-wait-ten-days-ambulance.html?ns_mchannel=rss&amp;ns_campaign=1490&amp;ito=social-twitter_mailonline">The Daily Mail</a>, a 97-year-old woman, Babette Burge, was found nearly dead on the floor of her home after being told she would have to wait ten days — ten days — for an ambulance. Not ten days for surgery. Ten days just to be transported to a hospital.
<blockquote>Just five days earlier, a paramedic from a local GP surgery had attended Ms Burge&#8217;s home to assess her condition and found that her leg was &#8216;shortened and rotated&#8217; &#8211; a sign of a fractured hip.</blockquote>
She was nearly 100 years old, lying on the floor with a broken hip, and was told she’d need to wait ten days for an ambulance.
She was later discovered barely breathing. Then she died.
This is what we’re supposed to envy? “Everybody gets health care” in the UK — assuming you can get to the hospital. The catch is that no one comes to get you. Universal coverage is lovely in theory. In practice, however, if you can’t secure transportation, it doesn’t matter how free the surgery is.
Meanwhile, in Canada, a prominent Canadian writer — very much on the Left, by her own description — recently admitted something chilling. She said she was offered medical assistance in dying (MAID) instead of care.
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet">
I’m about as far left as you can get… but we do have problems with MAiD in Canada.
How do I know? It was “offered” to me in lieu of care.
I’m disabled, I was alone, my conditions expensive.
Yes I was allowed to say “No”, but no alternative care was offered.
That’s coercion. <a href="https://t.co/LvCWd55esk">https://t.co/LvCWd55esk</a>
— Kelly (@broadwaybabyto) <a href="https://twitter.com/broadwaybabyto/status/2025364112348188828?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">February 22, 2026</a></blockquote>
<script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
Credit: @broadwaybabyto/X.com
That’s not compassion. That’s coercion.
And this isn’t an isolated anecdote. Canada has dramatically expanded medical assistance in dying, or MAID. In parts of Europe — particularly in countries like the Netherlands — similar policies are spreading. Elderly people, disabled people, chronically ill people, and even young people struggling with “seasonal depression” are increasingly being told that death is a “treatment option.”
Think about that.
In a system where the government is paying the bills, patients are not just patients — they’re line items. They’re costs. And when waitlists grow long and budgets grow tight, the incentives get dark very quickly. The cheapest patient is the one who isn’t there anymore.
On the one hand, American leftists insist we’re the only country in the civilized world without socialized medicine. On the other hand, you look at some of these “civilized” systems and see 97-year-olds waiting ten days for an ambulance and disabled citizens being nudged toward suicide because their care is expensive.
That’s not health care. That’s the opposite of health care.
Now, is the American system perfect? Of course not. It’s expensive. It’s complicated. It’s frustrating. But it is also the system that produces the vast majority of the world’s pharmaceutical innovation. It is the system that subsidizes global research and development. It is the system that people from all over the world come to when they need cutting-edge treatment.
It is not, however, a system where the government routinely suggests that you kill yourself because you’re inconvenient. There’s a reason that countries with fully socialized medicine struggle with wait times and rationing.
So before we swallow the talking point that America is uniquely cruel because we don’t have cradle-to-grave government medicine, it’s worth looking at what that actually looks like in practice. A nearly 100-year-old woman dying on the floor because no ambulance is available. A disabled Canadian writer being offered euthanasia in lieu of care.
Beware the supposedly greener grass on the other side of the fence. Especially when that fence is our northern border, separating us from the snow Mexicans.

Motion blur ambulance United States

Waiting 10 Days For An Ambulance — The Dark Side Of ‘Free’ Health Care

Waiting 10 Days For An Ambulance — The Dark Side Of 'Free' Health Care

Assisted Suicide

Canada

Death

England

Europe

Health Care

Hospitals

Michael Knowles

United Kingdom

Welcome to <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/introducing-upstream-a-lifestyle-and-culture-section-of-the-daily-wire" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Upstream,</a> The Daily Wire’s new home for culture and lifestyle. Real human insight and human stories — from our featured writers to you.
***
I’m a Luddite in many ways, at least in theory. I hate social media, prefer to spend my free time in nature — usually with a gun, bow, or rod and reel in my hand — and long for the days when you could buy a truck with a manual transmission. In fact, I have often quipped that America went to heck in a handbasket when Ford stopped putting manuals in their F-150s (2008, for those keeping track). I’m not a big fan of governments regulating just about anything, but I applaud the fact that millions of Americans have gravitated toward the MAHA movement, which prioritizes <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/rfk-flips-the-food-pyramid-and-announces-massive-changes-to-dietary-guidelines">whole foods</a> over modern, processed garbage.
If you called me a redneck or Jesus freak, I would have a hard time beating the allegations, but even as an old-school Midwesterner, I find many on the Right’s insistence that American life was better in the 1950s, or any glamorized bygone era, to be preposterous. A 2023 Pew Research Center survey <a href="https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2023/04/24/americans-take-a-dim-view-of-the-nations-future-look-more-positively-at-the-past/">found</a> that &#8220;around six-in-ten (58%) say that life for people like them is worse today than it was 50 years ago.&#8221; This is unfounded. <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/economist-thomas-sowell-alarmed-trumps-tariffs-may-spark-worldwide-trade-war" target="_blank" rel="noopener" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://www.dailywire.com/news/economist-thomas-sowell-alarmed-trumps-tariffs-may-spark-worldwide-trade-war&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1771705058176000&amp;usg=AOvVaw2LD7Zvboy56-RaMc8K3Mv_">The economist Thomas Sowell</a> is right about a great many things, including the fact that there are no solutions, only trade-offs.
I despise many of the side effects of the massive industry surrounding modern medicine. <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/best-of-2025-the-experts-are-finally-admitting-that-adhd-is-a-scam" target="_blank" rel="noopener" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://www.dailywire.com/news/best-of-2025-the-experts-are-finally-admitting-that-adhd-is-a-scam&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1771705058176000&amp;usg=AOvVaw39O6UpkChLorueBKQd6UIK">Overmedication</a> is a serious problem, and a healthy lifestyle is often a far better option than whatever a doctor may be prescribing. But when trouble comes knocking, it sure is great to have the kind of doctors and hospitals we take for granted today.
In 1950, the infant mortality rate in the U.S. was 29 deaths per 1,000 live births. Today, that number is around five out of 1,000. Childbirth is so remarkably safe in the modern world, at least in developed countries, that most people never think about mortality rates, but a couple of generations ago, there was a strong chance neither of my children would have survived. My daughter required an emergency C-section after my wife labored for several hours with no progress. Of course, C-sections were not uncommon in 1950, but they were <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/no-women-arent-50-more-likely-to-die-from-childbirth-today-than-a-generation-ago" target="_blank" rel="noopener" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://www.dailywire.com/news/no-women-arent-50-more-likely-to-die-from-childbirth-today-than-a-generation-ago&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1771705058176000&amp;usg=AOvVaw3NH7Rl_-azH8AWHB4aZR2p">riskier</a> for both the mother and baby.
The beginning of my son’s life in 2024 was more difficult by orders of magnitude. My wife’s water broke at 28 weeks, and the little man arrived at 29. As I sped to the hospital at 5 a.m., I assumed there was a 50-50 chance our boy would survive. He was well under three pounds, and I had never personally met anyone who had a baby at his gestational age. At the hospital, however, the doctors and nurses were shockingly calm and professional. I almost couldn’t believe it when they said, “He’s doing great.”
In 1950, there would have been essentially nothing that most hospitals could have done for my son. <a href="https://www.nicuawareness.org/blog/a-brief-history-of-advances-in-neonatal-care?utm_source=chatgpt.com" target="_blank" rel="noopener" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://www.nicuawareness.org/blog/a-brief-history-of-advances-in-neonatal-care?utm_source%3Dchatgpt.com&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1771705058176000&amp;usg=AOvVaw0_dKbPiC3DLnDgSerQBJ8D">Neonatal</a> care was nonexistent or in its infancy, depending on where you lived. Specialized incubators, ventilation, and steroid treatments were primitive, if available at all. Today, babies born at 29 weeks survive at a miraculous clip north of 90%.
I wouldn’t wish a nearly three-month stay in NICU on my worst enemy. It was certainly the most trying time of our lives, but by my son’s original due date, we were bringing him home, something that would have been nearly impossible before NICUs became widespread in hospitals across the West in the early 1970s. In a generation, modern medical advancements completely transformed how premature births are viewed in the developed world, not to mention the countless diseases, such as polio and smallpox, that have been almost entirely eradicated in the West. When was the last time you thought about malaria? There is a reason why the deadliest killer in human history is an afterthought outside of the third world.
Even when I’m in the woods, away from modern technology and the worries of 21st century life, I’m still the beneficiary of modernity. Heroes of the American outdoors, such as <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/episode/episode-1-daniel-boone?elementPosition=4&amp;row=0&amp;rowType=Vertical+Show+Episodes+Carousel" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Daniel Boone</a> and Davy Crockett, used inaccurate, expensive, and unreliable flintlock muzzleloaders to hunt big game. Terms such as “flash in the pan” and “keep your powder dry” are references to the myriad ways those rifles often failed to go boom, leading to an empty dinner table — or much worse in a combat scenario. I can get my cheap Ruger bolt-action rifle wet, forget to clean it, or even drop it out of a tree stand, and it&#8217;s still going to get the job done. Trail cameras, GPS mapping, modern camouflage, and scent control all give us a leg up on the tasty animals we love to hunt. Anyone who has fooled around with old, unreliable outboard motors will tell you how nice it is to power a boat with a modern, direct injection engine that fires up at the turn of a key.
I’m generally an <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/episode/what-will-power-the-ai-revolution">artificial intelligence</a> skeptic, but where did I go to find infant mortality rates from the 1950s? You guessed it: ChatGPT. Of course, I double-checked the numbers since AI is still notoriously, and sometimes hilariously, wrong on occasion. But as a writer, I’d be a fool not to use AI to source my work.
As much as I complain about the downfall of the manual transmission, my teenage, stick-driving self would never have imagined connecting a smartphone, which didn’t exist, to my truck using technology that didn’t exist, so I can listen to almost any song ever written for a measly $12.99/month. Modern life, the internet in particular, brings unique challenges that did not exist a generation ago. But I do know for a fact that those who insist that we got the short end of the stick never had a preemie.
***
Brady Leonard (<a href="https://twitter.com/bradyleonard" target="_blank" rel="noopener" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://twitter.com/bradyleonard&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1771705058176000&amp;usg=AOvVaw3xW8B8U6olS-OfXAGfYCuk">@bradyleonard</a>) is a writer, musician, and host of <a href="https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-no-gimmicks-podcast/id1207009705" target="_blank" rel="noopener" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-no-gimmicks-podcast/id1207009705&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1771705058176000&amp;usg=AOvVaw0eK8wJN6vsP-ActNqEXSSd">The No Gimmicks Podcast</a>.
The views expressed in this piece are those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of The Daily Wire.

Human and robot polygonal hands

I’m A Manual-Driving, Gun-Toting Skeptic — And I’m Glad I Live In 2026

babies

medicine

Upstream

President Donald Trump on Thursday officially launched the federal government&#8217;s highly anticipated direct-to-consumer medication website called TrumpRx.
The site, which Trump lauded as a major win for his administration, will give Americans access to big discounts on popular and high-priced medicines. Now, consumers can pay low prices that are comparable to those in other developed nations, keeping in line with the Trump Most-Favored Nation policy.
&#8220;America was being overcharged for medicine. The same drugs, made in the same factories, at the same dosages, are costing Americans up to 1,000% more than in any other country,&#8221; the live <a href="https://trumprx.gov/">TrumpRx site</a> reads. &#8220;This is unacceptable.&#8221;
&#8220;Starting tonight, dozens of the most commonly used prescription drugs will be available at dramatic discounts for all consumers throughout our new website, it&#8217;s called TrumpRx.gov,&#8221; the president announced at Thursday&#8217;s launch.
&#8220;For years, politicians from both parties have promised to bring down prescription drug prices and make health care more affordable, but they all failed. It was all words, as usual,&#8221; he added. &#8220;But I&#8217;m actually getting it done; it is done, actually.&#8221;
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-media-max-width="560">
🚨 <a href="https://twitter.com/POTUS?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@POTUS</a>: &#8220;Starting tonight, dozens of the most commonly-used prescription drugs will be available at dramatic discounts for all consumers throughout a new website: <a href="https://t.co/QSJ4wskHM1">https://t.co/QSJ4wskHM1</a>.&#8221; <a href="https://t.co/tB9FdIZMWZ">pic.twitter.com/tB9FdIZMWZ</a>
— Rapid Response 47 (@RapidResponse47) <a href="https://twitter.com/RapidResponse47/status/2019566096836366586?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">February 6, 2026</a></blockquote>
<div>
According to the White House, Trump was able to make deals with major companies like AstraZeneca, Eli Lilly, EMD Serono, Novo Nordisk, and Pfizer to get the lower drug prices for Americans.
&#8220;Additional drugs from other companies that have signed MFN pricing deals will be made available through TrumpRx.gov in the coming months,&#8221; a press release said, adding, &#8220;Depending on the manufacturer of a given drug, patients with valid prescriptions will be able to access savings through user-friendly coupons that can be printed or downloaded onto their phones or through channels set up by the manufacturer and integrated into TrumpRx.gov.&#8221;
</div>
<div id="attachment_1039745" style="width: 935px" class="wp-caption alignnone"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-1039745" class="wp-image-1039745 size-large" src="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2026/02/Screenshot-2026-02-05-at-7.33.51-PM-925x576.png" alt="" width="925" height="576" srcset="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2026/02/Screenshot-2026-02-05-at-7.33.51-PM-925x576.png 925w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2026/02/Screenshot-2026-02-05-at-7.33.51-PM-300x187.png 300w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2026/02/Screenshot-2026-02-05-at-7.33.51-PM-768x478.png 768w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2026/02/Screenshot-2026-02-05-at-7.33.51-PM-1536x956.png 1536w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2026/02/Screenshot-2026-02-05-at-7.33.51-PM-2048x1275.png 2048w" sizes=" (max-width: 925px) 100vw, 925px" />Screenshot: Trump RX</div>
A White House fact-sheet sent to The Daily Wire listed the following examples of reduced-price medications:
<ul>
<li>The monthly prices of Ozempic and injectable Wegovy will fall from $1,028 and $1,349, respectively, to an average price of $350 and as low as $199, depending on dosage strength.</li>
<li>The monthly price of the Wegovy pill will fall from $1,349 to as low as $149, depending on dosage strength.</li>
<li>The monthly price of Zepbound will fall from $1,088 to an average price of $346 and as low as $299, depending on dosage strength.</li>
<li>Gonal-F, one of the most commonly-used fertility drugs, will see its price reduced to as low as $168 per pen, depending on dosage strength.</li>
<li>The price of Cetrotide, another commonly used fertility medicine, will drop from $316 to $22.50.</li>
<li>The price of Ovidrel will fall from $251 to $84.</li>
<li>Bevespi Aerosphere, an inhaler used to treat chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), will be discounted from $458 to $51.</li>
<li>Airsupra, an inhaler used to treat asthma symptoms and attacks, will see a price drop from $504 to $201.</li>
<li>Eucrisa, a topical ointment for atopic dermatitis, will be discounted from $792 to $158.</li>
<li>Insulin Lispro will be available for as low as $25 per month.</li>
<li>Duavee, a medication used to treat hot flashes and osteoporosis, will see its price cut from $202 to $30.</li>
</ul>
America&#8217;s HealthShare (AHS), a popular health sharing ministry, praised the development from the administration.
<div>
“America&#8217;s healthcare system is broken, and people are simply paying too much for medicine and hospital visits. America’s HealthShare enthusiastically supports the effort to offer working families and elderly people on fixed incomes access to more affordable prescription drugs,&#8221; America’s HealthShare President David Lejeune said in a statement sent to The Daily Wire.
&#8220;Our law and policy makers can and should work with this Administration, in bipartisan fashion, to address long-term solutions to America’s healthcare system,&#8221; he added. &#8220;At America&#8217;s HealthShare, we are proud to support the Make America Healthy Again movement by restoring freedom and accountability in healthcare through an innovative approach.&#8221;
Related: <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/trumprx-trump-scores-significantly-lower-prices-for-popular-weight-loss-drugs">TrumpRx: Trump Scores Significantly Lower Prices For Popular Weight Loss Drugs</a>
</div>

US-VOTE-TRUMP

TrumpRx Officially Launches With Promise To Dramatically Cut Drug Costs For Americans

Donald Trump

Executive

Health

Politics

Prescription Drugs

When the Food and Drug Administration announced that the agency would be removing the black-box warning from hormone replacement therapy, or HRT, women everywhere threw their hands up in celebration.
And rightly so. America’s health agencies are finally acknowledging that women are not simply “little men,” and that research and clinical care must account for a woman’s unique biology and hormonal fluctuations across every stage of life.
But amid the cheering, some important nuance is being overlooked. The FDA’s decision to remove the black-box warning from HRT is just one example of how recommendations offered without adequate context or distinction may do more harm than good.
The idea that estrogen supplementation is a cure-all for the symptoms women commonly experience during perimenopause and menopause — hot flashes, disrupted sleep, fatigue, muscle aches, inflammation, weight gain, bloating, and mood swings — is a myth.
Often, women are not suffering from a lack of estrogen, but from what <a href="https://www.healthygutgirl.com/">Kitty Martone</a>, a holistic health educator who works with women to <a href="https://www.facebook.com/groups/1426024567689906">navigate perimenopause and menopause</a>, refers to as <a href="https://www.amenclinics.com/blog/what-is-estrogen-dominance/">estrogen dominance</a> — a state in which estrogen outweighs progesterone, producing symptoms that look identical to low estrogen.
Estrogen does not act in isolation, but the details are rarely explained to women. To be tolerated well, estrogen must be balanced by adequate progesterone and supported by a healthy metabolic rate. For many women, progesterone is the first hormone to decline — often years before estrogen meaningfully drops — due to chronic stress, under-eating, thyroid suppression, and blood sugar instability.
This creates a common paradox: estrogen may appear “normal,” or even low, on a lab test, yet functionally feel excessive in the body because there is not enough progesterone to counterbalance its effects. Women are then told they are estrogen-deficient and prescribed more estrogen, while symptoms such as anxiety, insomnia, migraines, heavy or irregular bleeding, bloating, and inflammation intensify rather than improve.
In these cases, simply prescribing more estrogen does not resolve symptoms. In fact, it can make them worse.
These mechanisms were not understood properly during the Women’s Health Initiative study, which was abruptly halted in the early 2000s upon a suggested correlation between HRT and breast cancer as well as heart disease. In an effort to recover from the fallout of the highly <a href="https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC10758198/">flawed study</a>, which caused millions of women to abandon hormone therapy altogether, the pendulum has swung in the opposite direction.
Cue the pharmaceutical ads: dancing women in sunflower meadows, singing about how wonderful life is with the latest HRT option. The fine print instructs women to “ask your doctor if it’s right for you,” but many doctors may not be properly equipped to offer nuanced guidance.
Over the past few decades, medical visits have been reduced to 15–20 minute symptom reviews that are translated into billing codes entered into a computer. While this system serves insurance and data collection, it fails to treat women as whole individuals. It leaves little room to explore how diet, stress, thyroid function, gut health, or metabolic status influence hormonal symptoms — particularly in perimenopausal women.
Martone argues that this system has created an environment where estrogen is prescribed casually, without sufficient context. “Doctors now essentially have carte blanche to prescribe estrogen for any hormone complaint — without evaluating detox pathways, metabolism, liver function, or estrogen clearance.”
Some clinicians have been cautioning against this oversimplification for decades. <a href="https://raypeat.com/">Dr. Ray Peat</a>, who studied hormones, metabolism, and stress physiology extensively, <a href="https://raypeat.com/articles/aging/aging-estrogen-progesterone.shtml">wrote about</a> how estrogen tends to accumulate under conditions of chronic stress and low thyroid function, while progesterone plays a stabilizing, protective role for both the nervous system and bodily tissues.
In plain terms, how a woman feels on hormones can have less to do with hormone levels and more to do with improper functioning of the liver, metabolism, and stress load at the time therapy is introduced. Two women can take the same prescription and have completely different outcomes — not because one is “doing it wrong,” but because their internal terrain is different.
This helps explain why so many women feel dismissed when HRT is presented as a simple solution. When symptoms worsen, they are often told to increase the dose or switch brands, rather than step back and ask whether the body is prepared to handle additional estrogen.
Martone emphasizes that women often need to experiment with hormones to discover individualized therapies that are right for them. Even low doses may require careful adjustment, alternative delivery methods, and significant trial and error — an experience that can be costly, frustrating, and far from straightforward.
Meanwhile, big pharmaceutical companies are circling middle-aged women like sharks around blood. With the FDA’s decision, they’ve gained an expanded customer base — one encouraged to start hormone therapy earlier and remain on it for decades.
The truth is no one — not even a doctor — can predict exactly how a woman will respond to HRT. Hormones are powerful biological signals, not cosmetic fixes. Their effects depend heavily on the body’s metabolic health, stress physiology, and ability to process and clear them.
The renewed interest in hormone therapy reflects a real and valid desire for relief for women. But before removing warning labels and declaring HRT a universal solution, it’s worth asking why those cautions existed in the first place.
Hormone replacement therapy is not a magic bullet. Women deserve care that honors complexity, not just convenience.
* * *
Jennifer Galardi is a Senior Policy Analyst for Restoring American Wellness in Heritage’s DeVos Center.
The views expressed in this piece are those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of The Daily Wire.

Nurse talks with female patient about prescription medication

What The FDA Doesn’t Tell Women About Hormone Replacement Therapy

Big Pharma

Doctors

Heritage Foundation

Pharmaceuticals

Women

There has been a clamor among some on the American Right for the United States to pull out of NATO, given Europe’s reflexively adversarial response to Trump’s Greenland saber-rattling. Whether we should remain in an alliance formed in a very different world back in 1949 is a question President Trump first raised during his initial term. The question actually has more merit than one might think at first blush.
One must ask what exactly NATO’s raison d’être was to begin with. It is difficult, eighty years on, to recall just how much of a mess Europe was at the time. Much of the continent had been razed by the most lethal of its many internecine conflicts. Europe was no longer at war, but it was not exactly at peace either. Stalin — a dictator with as much, if not more, innocent blood on his hands than Hitler — had advanced his Red Army all the way through Poland, then-Czechoslovakia, Hungary, Bulgaria, and half of Germany. That Soviet presence was massive: nearly ten million infantry backed by tens of thousands of tanks and aircraft. By 1945, the Red Army had become a military colossus that had just annihilated the most professional army in the world.
Given this looming threat just over the horizon, by 1949 Western Europe needed to band together to offer a deterrent to Stalin’s hegemony. And given the circumstances, the only military body capable of giving this new North Atlantic Treaty Organization its muscle was, of course, the U.S. Armed Forces. While Western Europe was rebuilt under the auspices of the Marshall Plan, American troops, armor, and aircraft kept the Soviets at bay. This mission was performed successfully all the way to 1991, when the Soviet Union — the very threat NATO was created to contain — abruptly collapsed.
That was 35 years ago. And yet NATO did not ride off into the sunset with its mission accomplished. Instead, it continued to expand, adding 16 new nations — each creeping closer and closer to an increasingly alarmed Russia (a country that suffered roughly 25 million dead repelling the last Western invaders from its soil).
But why the steady eastward expansion? Some NATO supporters argue that Putin’s resurgence and his aggression in Ukraine are answer enough.
But Ukraine and Russia share a convoluted history. Ukraine has long been contested land, where its story and Russia’s overlap in a region that has seen over seven hundred conflicts since the fall of Rome. This is not the first time war has raged from Crimea to the Donbas. Nor will it be the last. There is no reason for a non-Ukrainian to die fighting for that territory.
In fact, the only credible reason to continue our involvement in NATO is if Putin’s Russia poses the same danger as Stalin’s USSR once did. But today’s Russian military is not the Red Army of 1945 in which anywhere from 30 to 35% of its personnel were non-Russians (including 20% Ukrainians). And today Russia is demographically dying. Between 1990 and now—owing to the breakup of the Soviet Union, low birth rates, emigration, and early mortality often linked to alcoholism—Russia’s population has shrunk by roughly three to five million; that is a around a 2 to 4% decline. Over that same period, the U.S. population grew by more than 95 million, or roughly 38%. Even without the United States, the EU today has roughly four times Russia’s population. History shows that in modern war, population is often the best predictor of who prevails in a protracted struggle.
Russia’s economy is both small and oil-dependent. It has been called the world’s largest gas station for a reason. Anywhere from 20 to 30% of its economy depends on crude oil sales, depending on the year and market conditions — making it extremely vulnerable to sanctions or blockades. As it stands, Russia’s entire economy is smaller than that of three American states.
Speaking of economies, since NATO’s establishment, the GDP of EU nations has grown from barely $2.5 trillion to as high as $23 trillion today, an increase of more than 800%. This prompts the obvious question: if these nations have grown so rich, why do they still need us as if they were clearing rubble out of Cologne?
In other words, whether one agrees with leaving NATO or not, Trump’s re-evaluation of an alliance nearing the end of its eighth decade is not grounded in anti-EU whimsy, but in a classic cost-benefit analysis of its service to American interests.
Polls show that while only about 15% of Americans favor leaving NATO, as many as 30% of European residents believe the United States should reduce or end its role in Europe’s defense. This is ironic. If the same Europeans who love to hold up their model social-welfare systems — especially their “free” health care — understood how much of those systems are underwritten by the American taxpayer, they might take a less belligerent view toward one of their primary health care providers.
<div id="attachment_1030021" style="width: 874px" class="wp-caption aligncenter"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-1030021" class="size-large wp-image-1030021" src="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2026/01/GettyImages-2246537136-864x576.jpg" alt="GEILENKIRCHEN, GERMANY - NOVEMBER 13: NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte and North Rhine-Westphalia Premier Hendrik Wuest, dressed with flight jackets, stand in front of an E-3A AWACS (Airborne Warning and Control System) airplane while visiting the NATO Geilenkirchen Air Base on November 13, 2025 in Geilenkirchen, Germany. The base is the headquarters of the NATO Airborne Early Warning &amp; Control Force (NAEW&amp;CF). (Photo by Andreas Rentz/Getty Images)" width="864" height="576" srcset="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2026/01/GettyImages-2246537136-864x576.jpg 864w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2026/01/GettyImages-2246537136-300x200.jpg 300w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2026/01/GettyImages-2246537136-768x512.jpg 768w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2026/01/GettyImages-2246537136.jpg 1024w" sizes=" (max-width: 864px) 100vw, 864px" />Andreas Rentz/Getty Images</div>
What do I mean by this?
Take a look at the wealthiest EU nation — and the one with the most violent history with Russia — Germany. Germany currently spends roughly 2% of its €5 trillion GDP on defense, or about €100 billion annually. At the same time, it spends roughly ten to 12% of GDP on health care — around €500 billion per year. Estimates suggest that if American soldiers and airmen withdrew and Germany were left to fend for itself, Berlin would need to raise defense spending to as much as 4% of GDP. That means an additional €90–100 billion every year. That money has to come from somewhere. And since health care is the largest pool of discretionary spending (unless Berlin plans on raiding pensions), that is where it would most likely be found. A full American withdrawal would require cutting Germany’s health care system by at least 20%.
The consequences would be catastrophic. Growth spending would slow, wait times would balloon into rationing, co-pays and supplemental costs would rise, hospital consolidations would reduce access to emergency and specialized care, benefits would shrink, staffing shortages would worsen, and zero-cost access would disappear. Setting aside health outcomes, the social upheaval in a country accustomed to expansive care at minimal personal cost would be acute — and politically devastating for any party responsible.
And Germany is only one nation. If the entire EU had to raise defense spending to 4% to fill the void left by an American departure, it would require roughly €340 billion more per year — again, about 20% of total EU health care spending. Even partial offsets would place ten to 20% pressure on health budgets — unless already sky-high taxes rose further. Suddenly, the EU’s vaunted “free” health care system would be anything but.
Put more bluntly, NATO is not merely a security alliance — it is a massive American taxpayer-funded subsidy for Europe’s welfare state. That is the dirty little secret no one in Brussels wants to discuss. Every time a German walks into a “free” clinic or a Frenchman is wheeled into an operating room, roughly one euro in five is effectively paid by you and me. NATO — at least for its original Western democracies — needs the United States not to defend borders it could fund itself, but to prop up welfare systems already straining under their own weight.
There is a famous story in business lore about accounting wunderkind Harry Sonneborn, who told McDonald’s founder Ray Kroc that the real value of his restaurants was not the thin margins on hamburgers, but the land beneath them. “You’re not in the hamburger business,” he said. “You’re in the real estate business.”
In the same way, American contributions to NATO are not primarily about Europe’s defense. They allow European capital to be freed from defense spending — a burden borne by American taxpayers — and redirected toward social welfare. So when your taxes go to NATO, an alliance originally created to defend Europeans from other Europeans, you are not in the continental defense business. You are in the health care business. Just not for yourself. You are providing it for wealthy Germans, French, Brits, and Scandinavians who understand exactly how fragile their welfare systems are — and how quickly they would collapse if America walked away. After all, it is easy to pay for both guns and butter when someone else largely pays for the guns. It is quite another thing to foot the bill for both.
More the suckers us.
* * *
Brad Schaeffer is a commodities fund manager, author, and columnist whose articles have appeared on the pages of The Wall Street Journal, NY Post, NY Daily News, The Daily Wire, National Review, The Hill, The Federalist, Zerohedge, and other outlets. He is the author of three <a href="https://www.amazon.com/stores/author/B07MQJBJSD?ccs_id=55112527-86f6-4c89-b82e-a96d6869abed" target="_blank" rel="noopener">books</a>. You can also follow him on <a href="https://bradschaeffer.substack.com/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Substack</a> and <a href="https://x.com/bschaeffer123" target="_blank" rel="noopener">X</a>.
The views expressed in this piece are those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of The Daily Wire.

Leaders Gather For ‘Coalition Of The Willing’ Meeting In France

NATO’s Dirty Little Secret

Germany

Greenland

NATO

Russia

Ukraine

The House voted to extend subsidies for the Affordable Care Act for another three years, and the proposal now heads to the Senate.
The legislation made it to the floor after four Republicans joined Democrats in signing a discharge petition, and 17 Republicans ultimately ended up voting with the Democrats on the extension.
Those Republicans were Reps. Rob Bresnahan, Mike Carey, Monica De La Cruz, Brian Fitzpatrick, Andrew Garbarino, Jeff Hurd, David Joyce, Tom Kean, Nick LaLota, Mike Lawler, Ryan Mackenzie, Max Miller, Zach Nunn, Maria Elvira-Salazar, David Valadao, Derrick Van Orden, and Rob Wittman, according to Punchbowl News.
The successful discharge petition and subsequent passage is seen as a major victory for Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY).
“The House just decisively passed legislation that restores the Affordable Care Act tax credits. Over the objection of Donald Trump and Speaker Mike Johnson. If you don’t know, now you know,” Jeffries posted to X after the vote.
Lawler (R-NY) said in a statement that his vote suggests a “commitment to a bipartisan solution.&#8221;
“Healthcare affordability is not a political issue; it is a governing responsibility. My signature on the discharge for this bill, and my affirmative vote today, is not an endorsement of a clean 3-year extension, but rather a commitment to a bipartisan solution,” Lawler wrote. “I look forward to working with and voting on a Senate-amended bipartisan compromise in the weeks ahead. My focus is always ensuring Hudson Valley families aren’t caught in the gridlock, and that doesn’t change today.”
On the Senate side, <a href="https://www.axios.com/2026/01/07/senate-negotiations-health-care-aca-moreno" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Axios</a> reported that there could be a bipartisan deal in the works that would continue the pandemic-era subsidies for another two years.
The lengthy government shutdown in the fall had to do largely with Democrats seeking an extension of the subsidies as a precondition to keeping the government open. Now, the government is set to shutter again if a budget is not passed, but the House also passed some spending bills on Thursday to avoid another shutdown. There are still other bills needing to be worked out in Congress to completely avoid another shutdown, The <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2026/01/08/us/politics/house-spending-package.html" target="_blank" rel="noopener">New York Times</a> reported.

Federal Government Shuts Down After Congress Fails To Pass Funding Bill

House Votes To Extend Obamacare Subsidies For Another Three Years

Congress

Government Shutdown

Hakeem Jeffries

Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz Announces He’s Ending His Reelection Bid

The Somali Daycare Scam Is Just The Tip Of The Iceberg. The Truth Will Shock You.

childcare

Fraud

Health Insurance

Matt Walsh

Medicaid

Minnesota

Somalis

Tim Walz

It was a busy 2025 for Senate Majority Leader John Thune, who took the reins from Kentucky Sen. Mitch McConnell in November 2024.
The Daily Wire’s Washington Bureau Chief Tim Rice spoke with the Republican leader for Thursday&#8217;s episode of “Morning Wire” and reflected on what the first year of President Donald Trump’s second term has looked like in the upper congressional chamber. Thune also looked ahead to the big debate on Capitol Hill around health insurance, as some Affordable Care Act subsidies are set to expire on Wednesday.
As the Obamacare issue looms, Thune gave some insight into what he would be looking for in a health care plan.
“What we do believe makes sense is a model that a creates for an expansion of health savings accounts and putting the money back in the pockets of people in this country, incentivizing them to buy the insurance that makes sense for them, rather than buying the insurance the government tells &#8217;em they have to buy,” Thune said.
“And so they get a better rate, lower premium and better access to coverage. And I think those are things, those are elements of healthcare policy that we think makes sense, and none of which were included in what the Democrats voted on last week or what the Democrats in the House are trying to get done over there now,” he continued.
The health care debate focuses on whether the Obamacare subsidies should continue to keep premiums down. The lengthy federal government shutdown in the fall centered around the Obamacare debate, and it could strike Washington once <a href="https://www.livenowfox.com/news/government-could-shut-down-again-january-what-we-know">again</a> if lawmakers do not pass a bill to continue funding the government after January 30. Many conservatives argue that the program was unsustainable to begin with.
Thune said that 2025 was a &#8220;very productive&#8221; year thanks to President Donald Trump&#8217;s “One Big Beautiful Bill Act,&#8221; which was passed by Congress and signed into law in July.
“In fact, the president&#8217;s agenda, for the most part, was all accomplished in that &#8216;One Big, Beautiful Bill.&#8217; Whether it&#8217;s national security or the border, energy, tax policy, school choice have been a priority for the movement for a long time, newborn accounts, childcare,” Thune said, also noting the farm bill and “the biggest spending reduction literally in history.”
However, he noted that being able to get the bill passed and to the president’s desk in July “was a Herculean task.”
“If you&#8217;d spread that out, you know, these things over a long period of time, like we would normally do, then it would look like a lot of stuff,&#8221; Thune continued. He also highlighted different Trump administration nominees making their way through the chamber, as well as cutting red tape, especially on energy.
“So it&#8217;s been busy, just in terms of volume of votes and time, and then in session and all that too. But I think also, I would argue very productive. But doing it all in one big, a lot of that one big package, then it gets the peanut gallery going, like, &#8216;Why aren&#8217;t you guys doing anything this week?&#8217;” the Republican said.
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The majority leader also addressed national security concerns, as well as threats abroad, like the recent antisemitic terrorist attack in Bondi Beach, Australia.
“His investment in securing the border, working with us, his investment in America&#8217;s national security and projecting a policy of peace through strength around the world are all things that contribute to keeping people in this country safe,” the Republican said regarding Trump’s agenda on public safety.
“But when you see things like what happened in Australia, or even things that some of these horrible incidents here in the United States, they&#8217;re really tragic,” he said.
“I think that the best thing we can do is try to put in place the things that our law enforcement needs, that our military needs to deter bad behavior. And then, of course, obviously, when it happens make sure that people are prosecuted to the full extent of the law. And I think the president&#8217;s focus on law enforcement and on security is in a clear-eyed way, focused on that,” the majority leader later continued.

Senators Hold Their Policy Luncheons At The Capitol

Thune Previews Major Hurdle To Start 2026 After Momentous First Year As Majority Leader

John Thune

Senate

Rural health care is getting a big boost thanks to the Trump administration.
The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services announced on Monday that all 50 states will receive funding through the Rural Health Transformation Program, a $50 billion investment established through President Trump&#8217;s Working Families Tax Cuts legislation.
This $50 billion initiative is meant to strengthen and modernize health care in rural communities across the country. The funds will be allocated over five years, with $10 billion available each year from 2026 through 2030. For the first year, the money for each state ranges from $147 million to $281 million.
“Today marks an extraordinary milestone for rural health in America,” said CMS Administrator Dr. Mehmet Oz. “Thanks to Congress establishing this investment and President Trump for his leadership, states are stepping forward with bold, creative plans to expand rural access, strengthen their workforces, modernize care, and support the communities that keep our nation running.&#8221;
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet">
Thanks to the Rural Health Transformation Fund, created by congressional Republicans and signed into law by President Trump, we are investing $50 BILLION in rural healthcare across America! <a href="https://t.co/4pA6EsLc0f">pic.twitter.com/4pA6EsLc0f</a>
— House Republicans (@HouseGOP) <a href="https://twitter.com/HouseGOP/status/2005698509245198634?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">December 29, 2025</a></blockquote>
Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. said that because of the investment, rural Americans will have affordable health care close to home, free from bureaucratic obstacles.
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“More than 60 million Americans living in rural areas have the right to equal access to quality care,” Kennedy said. “This historic investment puts local hospitals, clinics, and health workers in control of their communities’ health care.&#8221;
The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services stated in a press release Monday that states are improving healthcare access in rural areas by planning efforts that will:
<ul>
<li>Bring More Care Within Reach</li>
<li>Strengthen and Sustain the Rural Clinical Workforce</li>
<li>Modernize Rural Health Infrastructure and Technology</li>
<li>Driving Structural Efficiency &amp; Empowering the Community Providers</li>
<li>Advance Innovative Care Models and Payment Reform</li>
</ul>
Oz told reporters Monday the $50 billion investment isn&#8217;t intended to pay off the bills: “The purpose of this $50 billion investment is to allow us to rightsize the system and to deal with the fundamental hindrances of improvement in rural health care.”
As part of the program, states are required to submit regular updates to the Centers for Medicare &amp; Medicaid Services. Oz said he wants states to get creative with the funds to change the way health care has been administered in rural America.
&#8220;By doing this the right way and by allowing more practitioners to move to these areas and training nurses and doctors in these rural areas, we think they will stay put and provide high-quality care,&#8221; Oz said.

Illustration by Daily Wire staff

Trump Admin Invests $50 Billion Into Rural Health Care

Dr. Oz

Health and Human Services

Mehmet Oz

Robert F. Kennedy Jr.

U.S.

United States lawmakers and other sex workers are holed up in Washington D.C. discussing what to do about Obamacare.
The problem is that the massive subsidies of taxpayer dollars that have been funding the bill are about to expire, and should they run out, the only way to continue doing the important work that Obamacare does would be to rake all our money into one big pile then set it on fire and dance around the blaze, chanting, “Oh, look, healthcare is affordable now! Just keep raking.”
Democrats are searching to find ways to keep Obamacare alive while simultaneously bringing down the cost of healthcare. They’re working on such cost-cutting innovations as building doctor’s offices on the top floors of skyscrapers, then having the exit door from the waiting room lead directly out of the building to a fifty story drop to the pavement below, thus limiting the patient’s healthcare needs to a mop and a headstone.
Another version of this inevitable Obamacare addendum is called Medical Assistance in Dying or MAID, in which doctors who previously fulfilled their sacred Hippocratic oath to “Do No Harm,” by performing abortions and castrating little boys for no reason, will now simply murder their patients to keep them from running up their healthcare bills.
The Democrats will attempt to sell the public on the MAID idea with an upbeat holiday-themed ad campaign called “Everybody Ought to Have a MAID.” The ads will include a catchy jingle with the lyrics: 
<blockquote>Why decay, day by day, when, hooray, you can just pass away? 
We killed your babies, then as a bonus, we tried to cut off your son’s cojones.
Now rather than bear the healthcare onus, all you have to do is phone us and you won’t be billed, you’ll just be killed.</blockquote>
And okay, it’s not Sondheim, but it works better than Obamacare.
<a href="https://www.dailywire.com/show/the-andrew-klavan-show"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="size-large wp-image-974735 aligncenter" src="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/09/Klavan-watch-now-1024x171.jpg" alt="" width="1024" height="171" srcset="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/09/Klavan-watch-now-1024x171.jpg 1024w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/09/Klavan-watch-now-300x50.jpg 300w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/09/Klavan-watch-now-768x128.jpg 768w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/09/Klavan-watch-now-1536x256.jpg 1536w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/09/Klavan-watch-now.jpg 1800w" sizes=" (max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px" /></a>
Now some lawmakers feel the problems with Obamacare are built into the system. The way Obamacare works is this: Imagine a strapping, healthy 25-year-old man. Now imagine a 90-year-old man slowly being devoured by a slimy, oozing, bubbling green old man fungus spreading inch by inch over his skin and painfully dissolving his flesh into a malodorous puddle of boiling blood-soaked goo. Now stop giggling. You people are sick. You disgust me.
Anyway, under Obamacare, the healthy 25-year-old and the bubbling, stinky fungus man pay exactly the same amount for health insurance. Now, of course, the 25-year-old will soon begin to think: Hey, I&#8217;m not sick. Why should I pay rates meant to cover dissolving fungus face over there? Ah, but Obamacare had a fix for that called the mandate. Under the mandate, if people refused to pay for healthcare they didn&#8217;t need, the government would simply steal their money at gunpoint and pay for it anyway. Unfortunately, the mandate was canceled, but luckily, the Democrats replaced the mandate with subsidies through which they steal everybody’s money at gunpoint but instead of calling it a mandate, they call it subsidies.
Now you might say: well, we can’t just go on stealing people&#8217;s money to pay for 90-year-old bubbling fungus people forever because we&#8217;d run out of money! But then you would be a Republican and you’d be forced to do nothing, because you’d be a contemptible poltroon, too cowardly to explain to people that we should leave the whole business to the free market.
If you’re a Democrat, you have a better plan, which is to keep subsidizing bubbling fungi until the national debt is so high we have to sell the entire country to China. Then the Chinese can deal with our healthcare by saying, “Oh, look, there’s a malodorous fungus person, let’s harvest his organs, then invade Taiwan.”
At that point, Republicans can finally take action by going on Fox News and shouting, “This is all the Democrats’ fault and would never have happened if someone had had the courage to stop them! Now we must go to war against China, which we would definitely do, if we could still afford a Navy.”
Democrats, on the other hand, will simply rake all our money into a big pile and set it on fire, then dance around the blaze, chanting, “Well, at least we still have Obamacare,” except in Chinese.
* * *
This excerpt is taken from the opening satirical monologue of “<a href="https://www.dailywire.com/show/the-andrew-klavan-show" target="_blank" rel="noopener">The Andrew Klavan Show</a>.”
Andrew Klavan is the host of “The Andrew Klavan Show” at The Daily Wire. Klavan is the bestselling author of numerous books, including the Cameron Winter Mystery series. The fifth installment, <a href="https://www.amazon.com/After-That-Cameron-Winter-Mysteries/dp/1613166869/ref=sr_1_1?crid=3EGZUC370LG46&amp;dib=eyJ2IjoiMSJ9.Y_NI0mDOKeowShheDQTVx5NH-fAeimJoCD56_T0Acpl8C0mup7uJf-nGGSRLEItaaekoDnvS2vWLMa4Zd2UBXQ8Y-g-P502jOWz-Y8IX3ZQsdlO7WMLrg1xIhNoKmjCorSWUR4C2l_RbiZ7apJ1MfPzGOrrEf7AdAXX6xwnJRVP_XqUfWuMuVthTWscaU3P4vgmS86-96n-721enHfX12CFQWTajqFbVnrsDkexfUf4.6_gTH6h1Bb9Pn375QdF_VAVZSayDvjQBBKGXE-MTiFo&amp;dib_tag=se&amp;keywords=klavan&amp;qid=1754049918&amp;sprefix=%2Caps%2C80&amp;sr=8-1" target="_blank" rel="noopener">After That, The Dark,</a> is NOW AVAILABLE. Follow him on X: <a href="https://x.com/andrewklavan" target="_blank" rel="noopener">@andrewklavan</a>.
The views expressed in this satirical piece are those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of The Daily Wire.

Democrats Fail To Extend Affordable Care Act Subsidies In Government Funding Deal

The Democratic Plan To Extend Obamacare By Using All Of Your Money

Andrew Klavan

Democrats

Humor

Obamacare

Satire

Suspected assassin Luigi Mangione reportedly pumped his fist in court on Monday, as video footage rolled allegedly showing officers finding a loaded magazine in his backpack.
<a href="https://www.foxnews.com/us/luigi-mangione-pumps-fist-court-police-body-cam-allegedly-reveals-loaded-magazine-found-inside-wet-underwear">According</a> to Fox News, Mangione pumped his fist while sitting in a Manhattan courtroom as body cam footage being played showed Altoona police officer Christy Wasser searching the suspect&#8217;s backpack and allegedly finding a magazine with bullets wrapped in wet underwear.
&#8220;There was another magazine hidden in his underwear,&#8221; Wasser says on the video. Another person then says, &#8220;it&#8217;s f***ing him,&#8221; Fox reported.
The footage was taken inside a McDonald&#8217;s, where Mangione was found after a days-long, nationwide manhunt. The Ivy League grad was then the only suspect in the assassination of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson.
Mangione was charged last year with stalking and murdering Thompson. The CEO, a father of two, was shot from behind while walking toward a New York City hotel to attend a corporate investor conference for UnitedHealthcare last December. 
Prosecution claims Thompson was targeted over the suspect’s grievances with the health insurance industry, citing a “manifesto.” Additionally, recovered shell casings included the inscriptions “delay,” “deny,” and “depose.”
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Mangione, who has pleaded not guilty on all counts, is facing life in prison for a state case against him, and potentially the death penalty if he’s convicted in a federal case. 
Currently, the 27-year-old is in week two of a pretrial evidentiary hearing for the state case. His lawyers are asking that key evidence be suppressed in the trial, arguing that the evidence was found on Mangione without a warrant and before Mangione was read his Miranda rights. The evidence in question is crucial to the case, including the 9mm handgun allegedly matching the murder weapon, and a notebook that prosecutors say contains writings revealing Mangione’s motive for the assassination. 
Mangione&#8217;s team also wants statements tossed that the suspect made to police, which they say were made before Mangione was read his Miranda rights.
The state is arguing that the search of Mangione’s backpack was lawful and not unreasonable since officers needed to search the suspect’s bag over safety concerns, to make sure there were no weapons or dangerous items on Mangione when they found him at the McDonald&#8217;s.
The prosecution also argues that Mangione spoke to them voluntarily and before he was in formal custody, so the Miranda requirement doesn’t apply. They also note that the only statement they plan to use is when officers asked Mangione for his name, and he allegedly gave a false name in response.
Related: <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/luigi-mangione-groupies-flock-to-courthouse-in-support-of-alleged-assassin">Luigi Mangione Groupies Flock To Courthouse In Support Of Alleged Assassin</a>

Luigi Mangione Attends State Court Hearing In New York

Luigi Mangione Pumps Fist In Court During Critical Moment Of Trial

Courts

Luigi Mangione

Murder

Imagine tuning into a Sunday football game. Amid the flurry of touchdowns and tackles, the commercials are filled with familiar names — State Farm, Allstate, Liberty Mutual, and Farmers — vying for your dollars to cover your cars, homes, and personal liability. You have choices, and the competing advertisements are evidence of a robust marketplace where consumers benefit from price competition and innovation. But imagine if, alongside those ads, you could also shop for your health insurance — across state lines, no different than car or home coverage. Here lies a fundamental problem in American healthcare: you cannot buy most health insurance plans outside your own state. Unlike auto and home insurance, which have broad risk pools and interstate competition, health insurance markets remain balkanized, resulting in fewer choices and higher costs for consumers.
The roots of this uniquely American challenge date back to World War II, when the Franklin D. Roosevelt administration instituted wage and price controls to curb inflation. Employers, competing for talent but unable to boost salaries, <a href="https://www.aqpsearch.com/news/a-brief-history-of-employer-sponsored-healthcare">began offering health insurance as a fringe benefit</a> — a decision that intertwined employment and insurance in a way that persists today. At the time, it may have seemed like progress, but it has left countless Americans dependent on their employers for coverage. When jobs change, so does coverage, leaving those between jobs exposed and often without affordable options. Those ineligible for Medicaid — because their income is just above the cutoff — are especially at risk for being uninsured.
Decades later, the Affordable Care Act (ACA) of 2010, commonly known as “Obamacare,&#8221; sought to address the coverage and affordability crisis — most acutely faced by people with preexisting conditions who previously found insurance unattainable unless provided through an employer. The ACA succeeded in expanding insurance coverage to millions, particularly through Medicaid expansion and the establishment of insurance marketplaces. However, for those who do not qualify for federal subsidies, premiums and deductibles have <a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/sallypipes/2025/10/14/how-obamacare-set-in-motion-todays-premium-crisis/">soared</a>. In many instances, families can face monthly premiums in the thousands, coupled with out-of-pocket costs so high that insurance feels more like catastrophic “coverage” than true protection. So while the ACA has done some good, it has not even come close to solving the affordability problem for which it is named.
The reasons for these persistent affordability issues are not mysterious. The underlying dynamics are straightforward, even as the system itself grows ever more complex. First, the ACA left state-level insurance monopolies untouched. Insurers still must navigate and adhere to rules that keep them within state lines, limiting the competitive pressure that could lower costs. Second, the oft-repeated promise from President Obama — “If you like your plan, you can keep your plan” — proved optimistic at best. The law introduced <a href="https://www.healthcare.gov/glossary/essential-health-benefits/">10 “essential health benefits”</a> that all compliant plans had to cover, forcing many consumers off less expensive plans that no longer met federal guidelines. As a result, they and many others have found themselves paying more for benefits they did not want or need, in effect <a href="https://www.law.georgetown.edu/georgetown-law-journal/wp-content/uploads/sites/26/2018/07/GT-GGLJ180016.pdf">subsidizing coverage for others</a>. The state of California even <a href="https://californiahealthline.org/news/article/covered-california-record-enrollment-aca-obamacare-subsidies-jeopardy/">brags</a> that most of those who are subsidized are provided with “Silver” plans, but doesn’t say how this is on the backs of those who can only afford “Bronze” plans. This is due to how the subsidy thresholds and cross-subsidization mechanisms work, which is grossly unfair.
Third, the entire model of private health insurance negotiation keeps true prices obscured from patients. When a patient asks for the “cash price” for a procedure, providers often cannot answer because what any individual owes depends on secretive agreements negotiated between insurers and healthcare providers. This lack of transparency keeps patients in the dark and undermines genuine market discipline.
So why, after all these years, have costs continued to rise with little improvement in affordability? The answer lies in political paralysis and conflicting priorities. Democrats, many of whom see the ACA as a bridge to “single-payer” or “Medicare for All,” have settled for more federal entanglement in healthcare. They frame healthcare as a universal right; yet, rights in a constitutional sense do not compel one party to render goods or services to another. Insurance, whether for health or property, is fundamentally a contract — a product someone may buy, not an entitlement.
Republicans, for their part, have ardently opposed the ACA for over a decade, but rarely offer comprehensive, workable alternatives. Their efforts have focused on repeal rather than reform, missing opportunities to build consensus around real improvements in price transparency, portability, and increased consumer choice.
What might genuine reform look like? First, Congress should act to preempt state laws that prevent insurers from <a href="https://manhattan.institute/article/reforming-health-insurance-competition-across-state-lines">selling across state lines</a>. This change would foster true competition, broaden risk pools, and, by analogy to auto and home insurance, drive down costs for most consumers. Second, policymakers should require transparent pricing from healthcare providers. Using the negotiated prices that already appear on every patient statement as a baseline, providers could set clear, upfront prices for services, allowing consumers to shop and plan accordingly. Third, the government should remove the “10 essential benefits” coverage requirement, letting consumers tailor plans to individual needs — just as with any other form of insurance — while maintaining the current requirement to cover those with preexisting conditions. High-risk pools, already used effectively in auto insurance for drivers with numerous or serious violations, could support those with extraordinary health risks without distorting the broader market.
In sum, addressing the high cost of American healthcare requires breaking up monopolies, shining a light on real prices, and empowering consumers to choose products that suit their needs, providing health insurance portability, and eventually ending employer-sponsored healthcare. Instead, employers could offer to cover or enhance existing employee policies as a fringe benefit, but the employee’s health insurance would no longer rely on any employer. Only then can Americans enjoy a health insurance marketplace as dynamic — and as affordable — as the ones that already exist for our cars and homes.
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Walter Myers III is a Southern California-based Senior Fellow at Discovery Institute.
The views expressed in this piece are those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of The Daily Wire.
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It’s Time To Say Goodbye To The Obamacare Failure

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