Steve Forbes, the famed Editor-in-Chief of Forbes Media and a former Republican Presidential candidate, intends to make Chris Christie own his reckless plan to raid Horizon’s insurance reserves.
He made the case in recent days on regional conservative radio outlets, comparing the Governor’s scheme to Venezuelan socialist economics.
“He says he wants to use the money to fight opiate addiction, a nice goal, but there are more better ways to do it, like asking the legislature for an appropriation instead of trying to strong arm and raid a private company, a non-profit and be very vague about where the money is going. He wants to rip out $300 million, raid it for $300 million,” the media personality told Talk Radio 120 WPHT’s Rich Zeoli at the end of last week. “What that would do is force the company, because these are reserves against future illnesses of their policy holders, what this would do is raise premiums $600 or more for individuals, over $1000 for a family of four. This is going to happen each year.”
Forbes offered a similar assessment to Bill Spadea of NJ 101.5.
This week, with the Horizon money grab appearing poised to clear the State Senate, Forbes is amping up his criticism of the Governor on social media:
Christie's brush-off response to criticism of Horizon takeover shows he has no substantive arguments to make. https://t.co/9QYwdBqJqk
— Steve Forbes (@SteveForbesCEO) June 28, 2017
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Lawmakers have until Friday to hammer out a budget deal or risk a shutdown in a year when every legislative seat is on the ballot.
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