Fox Pushes GOP's Dubious Claims Of Health Care Reform Cost Increase

Fox News is keeping up its tradition of promoting Republican talking points in its “news” broadcasts.

During a segment on the July 29 edition of America's News HQ, which covered a lawsuit designed to stop certain provisions of the Affordable Care Act, Fox News inserted this graphic:

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Note the source: “Senate Budget Committee Republicans.” Quite literally, in this case. The Weekly Standard reported on the Republicans' release of the chart, on which Fox clearly modeled its graphic:

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Fox News has a long history of pushing Republican talking points -- sometimes keeping the GOP's typos intact.

In uncritically presenting the GOP graphic, Fox ignored how Republicans and their media allies have routinely exaggerated the cost of the ACA. Indeed,  Fox and others had previously claimed that the ACA's cost had “doubled” from $900 million over 10 years to $1.7 trillion, the chart's third number. In fact, the CBO found that the cost had actually decreased.

The Republicans' latest number of $2.6 trillion is also dubious. According to The Weekly Standard, that number is based on a “Senate Budget Committee analysis (based on CBO estimates and growth rates).” The Standard did not explain how the Republicans computed that number, beyond repeating the discredited claim that the original estimate showed “only six years of spending under the plan in the original 10-year budget window.”

Video of Fox's use of the graphic after the jump.