After months of continuously dodging the question about whether or not middle class taxes would be raised to help pay for her Medicare for All plan, Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) finally released details of the plan last week and laughably pledged that the middle class would not have to pay for it:

In a new outline, Warren’s campaign said her single-payer health plan would cost the country “just under” $52 trillion over a decade, which includes $20.5 trillion in new federal spending. It estimates the proposal would cost just less than the estimated $52 trillion in spending for the current system over 10 years.

The Massachusetts Democrat’s campaign said her plan would give every American “full health coverage, and coverage for long-term care.” It added that it would do so with “not one penny in middle-class tax increases” — a response to criticism from rivals such as South Bend, Indiana, Mayor Pete Buttigieg.

It’s a ludicrous claim, and one even sympathetic journalists and Democrat-friendly media outlets know can’t possibly be true, but nevertheless she said again over the weekend that only billionaires would have to foot the cost:

NEWS: @ewarren told me her Medicare for All proposal won't raise taxes for anyone with under $1 billion after I asked who's in the "middle class" she promises not to raise taxes for pic.twitter.com/9u1e6ApGMi

— Zak Hudak (@cbszak) November 3, 2019

Donald Trump, Jr. caught wind of Warren’s answer to the question, and noted raising taxes on billionaires would barely touch the overall costs of her $52 trillion plan:

Her plan costs $52,000,000,000,000 and there are about 600 billionaires in the US. If you took $1 Billion from each of them you cover about 1% of her plan.

It’s just irresponsible to pretend she can do this without destroying the middle class and the economy. https://t.co/hRPaXIepxY

— Donald Trump Jr. (@DonaldJTrumpJr) November 4, 2019

Red State’s Bonchie made a similar observation over the weekend in an in-depth analysis of her claims:

Her plan costs $52 trillion over ten years (and that’s just the projection she gives). All of the combined total wealth of every billionaire in the United States only adds up to $3 trillion. The idea that she’s going to raise taxes just on that group and somehow pay for what she wants is laughably impossible. All the wealth of every billionaire in the entire world would barely pay for two years of her plan.

Warren has stated at every debate where she’s been asked the question that “overall costs” for the middle class would go down, but anyone reading between the lines could see she was avoiding speaking the truth about the fact that the middle class would have to help pay for it.

Think about this, too: She’s only just now releasing the details of her plan. In past debates, she’s affirmed she was on board with Sen. Bernie Sanders’ Medicare for All idea. Sanders admitted at the first debate the middle class would share the burden of paying for the costs of Medicare for All, and even after he said that she still championed the idea. So it stands to reason that if Warren supports his plan, she supports his payment structure, too.

This is one of the many problems that comes with latching on to the ideas of so many other candidates (as Warren has done) without diving into the details. Sooner or later you’ll have no choice but to answer for how they are paid for. The chickens are coming home to roost for Warren on this issue, and it’s about danged time.

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— Based in North Carolina, Sister Toldjah is a former liberal and a 16+ year veteran of blogging with an emphasis on media bias, social issues, and the culture wars. Read her Red State archives here. Connect with her on Twitter. –