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Hello and welcome to the latest edition of the Punch Bowl News Reback podcast. I'm joined by Sammy Handler,

our portal author and policy expert here at Punch Bowl News to talk about one of the most important

issues facing House Republicans in the coming days, and that's Medicaid and what to do about Medicaid

cuts. Sammy, thanks to joining me.

Thanks so much for having me, Max. It's always great to have you on the podcast. Always a great

guest. And you've been covering this issue super closely. And everyone in Washington and frankly,

around the country is going to be tuned into Medicaid as the House returns from recess in just a couple

days. Tell me about what is facing specifically the House Energy and Commerce Committee,

because that's where all the real action is, right? Yes, totally. That's right where the action's

going to be starting when lawmakers return on Monday. The House Energy and Commerce Committee

was directed to cut $880 billion to pay for reconciliation, and much of that has to come from

Medicaid. And we know that because that's what the Congressional Budget Office has said,

that there's not a lot of other areas

and energy and commerce can cut from to reach that number. The problem here, of course, is that

they haven't really settled on how to do that yet, and that's because there's pressure from

moderates in the Republican Party to not cut Medicaid, which we've all covered very closely.

I know you had an item on that recently with the ad buys. And then, you know, there's the

spending hawks, the hardliners who want to see really deep cuts and want to make sure spending

...