Buttigieg: Warren health care plan is a ‘my way or the highway’ approach

South Bend, Ind., Mayor Pete Buttigieg’s presidential campaign slammed Sen. Elizabeth Warren’s (D-Mass.) new plan to transition the country to a “Medicare for All” system, claiming it leaves Americans no choice in deciding their health care coverage.

“Senator Warren’s new health care ‘plan’ is a transparently political attempt to paper over a very serious policy problem, which is that she wants to force 150 million people off their private insurance — whether they like it or not,” Lis Smith, the Buttigieg campaign’s communications director, said in a statement. 

“Despite adopting Pete’s language of ‘choice,’ her plan is still a ‘my way or the highway’ approach that would eradicate choice for millions of Americans,” she added.

“No amount of Washington political games can save her plan from that fatal flaw: she still doesn’t trust the America people to make the right health care decisions for themselves,” the statement also said.

Buttigieg, who has sought to position himself as a centrist rival to Warren in the 2020 Democratic primary, has emerged as a vocal detractor of her comprehensive health care plan, which would institute a single-payer system and eliminate private insurance.

The Massachusetts senator released a plan Friday that would gradually move the country toward Medicare for All over the course of three years.

Her transition process would include gradually building support for Medicare for All in her first 100 days in office, with the first step entailing passing legislation to boost the availability of government-run insurance.

Health care has emerged as a chief fault line in the crowded Democratic primary field, as candidates from the center and left debate the best way to expand health care coverage for Americans.

Warren and Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) have proposed ambitious plans that would eliminate private insurance, though more centrist candidates have called that too expensive.

Buttigieg has unveiled a “Medicare for All who want it” plan that would expand Medicare coverage while allowing Americans to keep their private health insurance plans.