Christie on Opposition to Graham-Cassidy: They ‘Steal Money From My State to Give It to Another State’

Wednesday on MSNBC’s “Deadline: White House,” Gov. Chris Christie (R-NJ) said he opposed Senate Republicans latest attempt to repeal and replace Obamacare with the Graham-Cassidy bill.

Christie said, “I oppose the bill for the significant reason that it is bad for my state. I am the governor of New Jersey. This bill will cut 4 billion dollars in Medicaid funding to the people of my state. I can’t be in favor of that for New Jersey, and I favor block grants, but this bill is used to manipulate the money to send money from some states to other states. I don’t think we need to do that.”

He continued, “Here’s my view. I like almost everything about this bill, and they could make changes to it that might bring me around, but if they’re going to steal money from my state to give it to another state who didn’t choose to expand Medicaid, I can’t be in favor of that and injure the people in my state to help people in another state whose leaders made the conscious decision at that time not to take expansion. That was their decision. If they believe that was the right decision, they don’t need more money now because they philosophically didn’t agree with it. I think it’s the right thing to do and I’m not doing something that hurts my state. I’m the governor of my state. I’m not going to do this.”

Follow Pam Key on Twitter @pamkeyNEN