Donald Trump and maga Republicans are hearing wrath from voters about the wrong being done when they cut Medicaid funding

To the Editor: I read the New York Times opinion about Mrs. Aldhizer from North Carolina and her severely disabled son. I felt compassion and sadness, not just for her and her family, but for the countless others in our country who have been — or who soon will be — subjected to the cruelty of an administration that refuses to see each of us as human beings.

Mrs. Aldhizer’s concern is the instability of Medicaid over the coming months and years and its impact on her family, and she asks us to help her, a stranger, ensure that the program continues. 

I wonder if she herself extends her call for charity to other issues that are less personal to her, such as the right to protest peacefully without the threat of armed soldiers standing nearby, or the concerns among young people about the effects of climate change, or the trauma of a child sitting in a classroom after seeing a parent dragged off by ICE agents.

It is human nature to see one’s own needs as being of greater importance than the needs of others. I hope Mrs. Aldhizer's brand of conservatism allows her to step outside her own situation to extend the same charity to those whom she will never meet, but who are just as deserving of that charity as her son.

From: Chris Swenson in La Jolla, California

To the Editor: I sympathize with Rachel Roth Aldhizer and her severely disabled son. My own daughter has cerebral palsy and cannot walk, talk or feed herself. She still needs constant care at age 28. Medicaid has been essential for her, and soon she will live in a group home for disabled adults, funded by Medicaid.

Mrs. Aldhizer describes how Medicaid helped her family. My question is this: would she feel the same way about Medicaid if she didn’t have a disabled child❓

In my experience, conservatives are concerned about people different from them only when it affects them personally. They are against gay marriage until they find out their child is gay. They are against gun regulations until a loved one is shot. They are against abortion care until a family member nearly dies from a miscarriage. There are conservatives who were against rights for transgender people but found understanding and empathy within themselves when their child came out as trans.

Perhaps Mrs. Aldhizer has always supported government aid. But when conservatives govern, they typically lower taxes for the wealthy and reduce services for the vulnerable. Kentucky expanded Medicaid in 2014, North Carolina in 2023. Both states had Democratic governors who supported Medicaid expansion. North Carolina had a Republican supermajority that blocked expansion for nearly a decade.

Liberals, for all our faults, are the ones who stand with people unlike ourselves. We insist on help for the disadvantaged. We support Medicaid whether our family needs it or not.

From:  Hedy Kalikoff in Hastings-on-Hudson, N.Y.

To the Editor: As a fellow North Carolinian and former Medicaid provider, I fully sympathize with the plight of Rachel Roth Aldhizer’s family and others like them. But I find her call to appeal to the compassion of our legislators misguided.I believe we had ample evidence of the Republicans’ intentions, and preserving Medicaid funding was not a priority for them.

The time to have made our voices heard was at the ballot box. Sadly, (especially to all those who could have voted but chose to stay home....) now it’s too late.

From Cyndy E. Lively in Winston-Salem, N.C.

To the Editor:  I empathize with Rachel Roth Aldhizer and her 4-year-old son. However, we collectively voted for an administration that does not. This sentiment was expressed by Elon Musk when he said, “The fundamental weakness of Western civilization is empathy.”

As long as we embrace indecent behavior, or remain silent and passive in the face of indecent behavior, we will be a nation unmoved by the suffering of our fellow citizens or the death of an innocent child.

We will not speak up because it becomes increasingly dangerous and scary to do so. We will wrongly believe that the indecent behaviors of our government will be inflicted only on criminals and people who deserve it. Someone else, not us. 

(Maine Writer: First They Came – by Pastor Martin Niemöller:  

First they came for the Communists
And I did not speak out
Because I was not a Communist
Then they came for the Socialists
And I did not speak out
Because I was not a Socialist
Then they came for the trade unionists
And I did not speak out
Because I was not a trade unionist
Then they came for the Jews
And I did not speak out
Because I was not a Jew
Then they came for me
And there was no one left
To speak out for me)

We will misguided and believe this right up to the moment there is scary a knock on our door.

From Jay Ahlbeck in Plainfield, New Jersey