Dr. Mehmet Oz lashed out at a reporter after she challenged President Donald Trump's effort to shore up rural health care with a new $50 billion fund, despite the much larger Medicaid cuts included in the same law.
The heated exchange came during an interview with Molly Martinez of Gray Media's Washington News Bureau. Martinez claimed the White House was providing a solution to a financial problem its own legislation caused.
Martinez pointed to projections showing that Trump's signature domestic policy law would reduce federal Medicaid spending in rural areas by $137 billion over ten years, while the administration has also advanced a $50 billion initiative to improve medical services in rural regions.
Oz, who leads the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, erupted at the numbers, raising his voice.
In a video she posted on X, Oz told Martinez, "You're repeating talking points that are not only wrong, but they're deliberately duplicitous.”
Martinez then asked him to explain what he believed was wrong.
Oz dismissed the $137 billion figure as an inaccurate depiction of what goes directly to rural institutions, arguing that Medicaid funding generally passes through the states to large hospital systems in cities and doesn't reach smaller, rural providers.
He argued that the administration's new rural health program delivered an unprecedented increase in resources for those communities.
However, Martinez didn’t back down and pressed the comparison again, accusing the administration of returning only a small fraction of what its law would take away.
"That is incorrect and dishonest and a deliberately duplicitous question," Oz responded.
Independent research backs the funding comparison based on the underlying figures. The Kaiser Family Foundation estimates that the law which Trump signed on July 4, 2025, will result in a reduction of federal Medicaid spending across the country by $911 billion over a ten-year period, including the $137 billion for rural areas.
The Rural Health Transformation Program, which has a $50 billion budget, will provide states with funding over a five-year period from 2026 to 2030. However, according to KFF, this total represents about 37 percent of the estimated rural Medicaid reductions, even though the programs have different aims and time frames.
The grants also can't replace the lost Medicaid revenue, since federal rules limit direct payments to providers to 15 percent of a state's award and prevent using those funds to supplement existing Medicaid payments.
To support her figures, Martinez referred to the Congressional Budget Office and the Center for American Progress. She also mentioned the impact on rural patients who must travel long distances to reach hospitals.
After Martinez told Oz that she has spoken to people who find healthcare unaffordable and asked what he has to say to them, the former TV show host responded: "We're pouring money into places where the money should be spent."
