Harris to propose new Medicare home care benefit for seniors

Kamala Harris during a Tuesday appearance on “The View” is expected to announce a new policy aimed at helping families care for aging seniors.

The vice president will propose establishing a home care benefit through Medicare focused on helping families afford the cost of caring for seniors at home instead of in nursing facilities, according to a senior campaign official granted anonymity to share details of the proposal.

The senior official said the proposal would help older Americans age at home and avoid the costs of in-facility care, which can be thousands of dollars more a month than in-home care. The benefit would cover the costs of various home care services, including in-home health aides.

The proposal is the latest in a line of campaign promises from the vice president aimed at helping parents and other caregivers, something that was one of President Joe Biden’s top domestic priorities. In August, Harris announced a plan to both bring back the pandemic-era expanded child tax credit, as well as establish a new $6,000 tax credit for parents of newborns.

Studies have shown that more than 40 percent of Americans, more than 105 million people, currently provide unpaid care.

Harris will also use her appearance on “The View” to appeal to the so-called sandwich generation, the roughly quarter of Americans who are both raising children and caring for aging parents — and that Harris campaign data shows contains a large percentage of remaining undecided voters, the campaign official said.

The vice president’s new policy proposal comes as both candidates also try to shore up their standing with seniors. Former President Donald Trump has repeatedly stressed during the 2024 campaign that he would not cut Medicare or Social Security if elected again and that he would not raise the retirement age.

Harris plans to pay for the new senior home care benefit by expanding Medicare drug price negotiations, increasing discounts for certain brand-name drugs in Medicare that drug companies are required to provide, and reducing hidden costs associated with the middlemen in the drug pricing process known as pharmacy benefit managers, among other measures.

Medicare currently only covers at-home skilled nursing care, home health aides and other kinds of assistance under specific circumstances, leaving families to foot the costs of in-home care on their own.

The issue is also personal for Harris, who has talked on the campaign trail about taking care of her mother, Shyamala, when she was dying of cancer.

“I remember being there for my mother when she was diagnosed with cancer. Cooking meals for her, taking her to her appointments,” Harris said during a recent campaign stop in Pittsburgh. “I know caregiving is about dignity.”