Michigan Senate Democrat candidates’ support for either Medicare for All or a public option endanger the state’s rural hospitals, studies show.
Rep. Haley Stevens (D-MI) recently entered the race to replace retiring Sen. Gary Peters (D-MI). The battle for the Michigan Senate seat is a three-way horse race between Stevens; Abdul El-Sayed, the former director of the Wayne County, Michigan, health department; and state Sen. Mallory McMorrow.
Although the candidates have varying qualifications for the soon-to-be open Senate seat, all three Senate Democrats have called for a radical transformation of American health care.
Stevens has been a vocal proponent of Medicare for All, although she has over the years shifted her support for a public option. A public option would create a government health insurance option to compete against private plans, and Americans under this plan could purchase Medicare or another government insurance plan.
“We absolutely need to propose legislation to provide Medicare for All,” she said during a Democrat candidate forum in 2018 for Michigan’s 11th congressional district:
“But it doesn’t have to be. And to fix it, we need to break the chokehold that billionaires and oligarchs like Donald Trump and Elon Musk have on our politics and economy. It’s not just about what we’re fighting against -– it’s about what we fight for. Michiganders deserve an economy that works for them, guaranteed healthcare, clean air and water, and affordable housing. Just as I have in Detroit and Wayne County, I’m running to deliver government services that work for the rest of us,” El-Sayed said in April.
“That’s why I’m fighting to guarantee health insurance as a right for everyone,” El-Sayed wrote.Trump, Musk, and Mike Rogers want to cut Medicaid when it’s one of the last lifelines rural communities have left. It’s wrong and un-American.
— Dr. Abdul El-Sayed (@AbdulElSayed) April 20, 2025
That's why I'm fighting to guarantee health insurance as a right for everyone. pic.twitter.com/UuApWPuAPW
McMorrow favors a public option.
However, these Senate Democrat candidates’ advocacy may create additional headaches, as many experts have said Medicare for All and a public option may force the closure of their rural hospitals, especially for the Wolverine State’s 35 rural hospitals.
Hospital administrators have said that Medicare for All and other single-payer healthcare systems would close hospitals, or even scale back services, amenities, and staff. Studies have said that Medicare for All will cost $32 trillion over ten years and would require “historic” tax increases to pay for it.
A 2019 study conducted by Navigant Consulting found that a government health insurance option, or a public option, would close more than half of America’s rural hospitals.
Breitbart News reported at the time:
The study found that as many as 55 percent of rural hospitals, or 1,037 hospitals across 46 states, could become at risk of closure from a public option. The closure of those rural hospitals represents more than 63,000 staffed beds and 420,000 employees.
Even if rural hospitals were not to close as the result of the creation of a public option, the study finds that the public option could negatively impact access to and quality of care through elimination of rural hospitals’ services and reduction of clinical and administrative staff and cripple the rural communities the hospitals serve.
Lauren Crawford Shaver, the executive director of the Partnership, said that despite many Democrats’ attempts to portray the public option “as a much more moderate alternative to ‘Medicare for all,’ the truth is the public option would be also damaging, potentially putting the health and well-being of our rural communities at risk.”
Sean Moran is a policy reporter for Breitbart News. Follow him on X @SeanMoran3.
