As part of President Trump's sabotage of Obamacare, he canceled subsidies to insurers that help low income people afford health care, saying he was ending "bailouts" for insurers.



He's slammed a bipartisan compromise to restore the subsidies for the same reason.



Here's why it's a flat-out lie.



A bailout is financial help that rescues a failing business from collapse. This is not a bailout, because the money doesn't line the pockets of insurers; it goes to doctors, hospitals and labs.

Trump's open sabotage of Obamacare | Editorial



Insurers are not better off than they were before, they are simply made whole after offering discounted rates for lower-income people getting medical services.



And cutting off the subsidies won't save the federal government money - it will actually give insurers more taxpayer dollars, because they would still be required to offer the discounted rates and need to raise premiums to compensate.



This means a separate set of subsidies given out by the government, to offset the higher cost of premiums. The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office found that killing the cost-sharing subsidies, as Trump has done, would add $194 billion to the federal deficit over the next decade, because the government will pay more to subsidize premiums.



So Trump's decision is actually costing taxpayers more. Which means calling it a "bailout" is not just dishonest, but dumb.

Bookmark NJ.com/Opinion. Follow on Twitter @NJ_Opinion and find NJ.com Opinion on Facebook.