GOP Health Care Opponent Hits Talk Shows, Lies About Stimulus

Former Republican lieutenant governor of New York Betsy McCaughey made appearances on Glenn Beck's Fox Show and Lou Dobbs’ CNN show where she falsely claimed the stimulus package included laws that would affect citizens' health care negatively.

However, on CNN, senior medical correspondent Elizabeth Cohen fact-checked McCaughey’s claims, finding that the bill “didn’t actually, specifically say” what McCaughey claims it says. Cohen then explained how investment in health IT would allow doctors to “switch over from those paper records that most of them use to electronic records,” which “many say are much more efficient and allow for much more patient safety.”

In 1994, McCaughey was a key player in the attacks against the Clinton health care
plan, writing an article in The New Republic that falsely claimed the plan would lock people into government-run care.