Obama's wild claims of success for ObamaCare earns 4 Pinocchios from the Washington Post. In other words, Obama just told another whopper.

All of the following is cut and paste from the WaPost.  You should read the full article  ~blog editor.  

Obama’s claim that 7 million got ‘access to health care for the first time’ because of his Medicaid expansion

• Read the full article here,  at the Left leaning washington post BY GLENN KES

(Brendan Smialowski/AFP/Getty Images)

“We’ve got close to 7 million Americans who have access to health care for the first time because of Medicaid expansion.”

The Fact Checker has written several times about the fuzziness of the Medicaid numbers issued by the Obama administration. But it is like playing whack-a-mole. Every time we rap someone for getting it wrong, the same problem pops up someplace else.

But here is the ultimate authority — the president of the United States — making the problematic claim that everyone counted under the administration’s Medicaid math is getting “access to health care for the first time.” Time for a refresher course!

The Facts

Medicaid is the health-care program for the poor, generally those at or below the federal poverty level. The Affordable Care Act expanded it to individuals with incomes of up to 138 percent of the federal poverty level (about $15,850), though the Supreme Court gave states the option of whether to participate. . . . .   

Avalere, a health consulting firm, in a recent analysis raised serious questions about the 6.3 million Medicaid figure [Obama's "7 million" claim ~ blog editor] , estimating that only 1.1 million to 1.8 million of the claimed enrollees could be attributed to the Affordable Care Act. That estimate generated headlines, including a full report in The Washington Post that said it suggested “many of the people who have joined the program since the initiative’s rollout in October would have done so absent the law.”

Charles Gaba, who keeps careful track of enrollment figures at ACASignups.net, has disputed some of Avalere’s reasoning but has also concluded that not all of the Medicaid data released by the administration can be attributed to the ACA. Here’s how he breaks down the numbers as of Feb. 22:

7,132,277 — deemed eligible for Medicaid

4,815,617 — Medicaid expansion states only, including people coming out of the “woodwork” and “normal churn”

2,600,000 — Medicaid expansion states only, no “woodwork” or normal churn of Medicaid applicants  . . . . . .   

The White House declined to comment.

The Pinocchio Test

What does this mean in terms of evaluating the president’s statement? He seems to be falling into the same trap as other Democrats, and some reporters, by assuming that everyone in the Medicaid list is getting health insurance for the first time because of the Affordable Care Act. But that number is nowhere close to 7 million. It could be as low as 1.1 million (Avalere) or as high as 2.6 million (Gaba.) If one wanted to be generous, one could include people coming out of the woodwork, even though they would have been covered under the old law, but no one is really sure what that figure is.

In any case, no matter how you slice it, it does not add up to 7 million. It is dismaying that given all of the attention to this issue, the president apparently does not realize that the administration’s data are woefully inadequate for boastful assertions of this type.

Four Pinocchios

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