After facing backlash from the White House and members of his own party, Florida Sen. Rick Scott on Friday amended a controversial proposal in his “12 Point Plan to Rescue America” that would have sunset all federal legislation after five years, including Social Security and Medicare.

What You Need To Know

  • Florida Sen. Rick Scott on Friday amended a controversial proposal in his “12 Point Plan to Rescue America” that would have sunset all federal legislation after five years, including Social Security and Medicare

  • It now includes very specific exceptions for “Social Security, Medicare, national security, veterans benefits, and other essential services"

  • President Joe Biden made the issue of Medicare and Social Security a key focus of his State of the Union address earlier this month, and at events following his speech to the nation

  • Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., also hammered Scott on the plan, suggesting in a radio interview that it could hurt his re-election prospects in Florida next year

The plan initially read: “All federal legislation sunsets in 5 years. If a law is worth keeping, Congress can pass it again.”

It now includes very specific exceptions for “Social Security, Medicare, national security, veterans benefits, and other essential services.”

The plan also also includes a note to some of his most staunch critics: President Joe Biden, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., and Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky.

“Note to President Biden, Sen. Schumer, and Sen. McConnell — As you know, this was never intended to apply to Social Security, Medicare, or the U.S. Navy,” the plan reads in bold letters. (Scott served in the United States Navy.)

President Biden made the issue of Medicare and Social Security a key focus of his State of the Union address earlier this month, hammering Scott and fellow Republican Sens. Ron Johnson, R-Wisc., and Mike Lee, R-Utah, for their comments on the entitlement programs. He also made defending the programs a major talking point events in Wisconsin and Tampa, Fla., following his address.

"I know that a lot of Republicans, their dream is to cut Social Security and Medicare," Biden said at the event in Scott’s home state of Florida last week. "Let me say this, if that's your dream, I'm your nightmare.”

Ahead of Biden’s Tampa event, staffers handed out copies of Scott's proposal.

The president also made protecting Medicare and Social Security a key theme of his campaign for Democrats in last year's midterms, which saw the president's party outperform expectations of a "red wave.” Scott released the “12 Point Plan” while serving as chair of the National Republican Senatorial Committee, the Senate GOP’s campaign arm.

McConnell also hammered Scott on the plan, suggesting in a radio interview that it could hurt his re-election prospects in Florida next year.

“That’s not a Republican plan, that was the Rick Scott plan,” McConnell told Kentucky radio host Terry Meiners last week, adding: “I think it will be a challenge for him to deal with in his own re-election in Florida, a state with more elderly people than any other state in America.”

In an op-ed for the Washington Examiner, Scott claimed that his plan was "obviously not intended to include entitlement programs such as Medicare and Social Security" and accused Biden, Schumer and McConnell of "shallow gotcha politics."

"I have never supported cutting Social Security or Medicare, ever," Scott charged. "To say otherwise is a disingenuous Democrat lie from a very confused president. And [McConnell] is also well aware of that. It’s shallow gotcha politics, which is what Washington does."

Republicans have accused Biden of lying following his comments at the State of the Union, alleging that he misled Americans by claiming that Social Security and Medicare are part of their demands to agree to raise the debt ceiling this year. 

But the president’s accusation that some GOP members have proposed sunsetting the programs was not fabricated out of thin air, and he acknowledged that he didn’t believe the majority of Republicans — “I don’t even think it’s even a significant” amount, he said — supported such a plan. 

At a White House briefing on Friday, chief spokesperson Karine Jean-Pierre said that Biden "congratulates Sen. Scott on joining the 'post-State of the Union red wave,'  as we have seen from Republicans, acknowledging that they are in fact been attempting to put Medicare and Social Security on the chopping block, because that's what they are actually saying, that they were indeed attempting to do that."

"We have the facts: the past year, he has explained the absence of an exception by saying, 'if it's worth keeping, we're going to keep it,'" Jean-Pierre continued. "But make no mistake, his true colors are undeniable and on the record. They have been speaking out both sides of their mouths here. That's what Republicans in the Senate, and Congress, more broadly, have been doing."

Spectrum News' Ryan Chatelain contributed to this report.