Quick Fact: Varney ignores CBO estimate while claiming health bill "does not" cut deficit

Varney claims "almost every estimate" of health care reform "says it adds to the deficit in the long run"

From the January 19 edition of Fox News' Fox & Friends:

BRIAN KILMEADE (co-host): I want to tell you what the president's message is. Health care knocks down the deficit. And if you pass health care, that'll be a way of attacking the deficit. And if you have Scott Brown, you're not going to have health care.

VARNEY: Do you know anybody who really believes that the health care plan as it's now being formulated will actually bring down the deficit over the long term?

KILMEADE: President Barack Obama.

VARNEY: Do you know any -- yeah, OK.

KILMEADE: And Rahm Emanuel.

VARNEY: Forgive me for saying it -- I think they're wrong. This is going to create a massive new entitlement program, as it now stands. You're going to have 10 years of taxes, and you're only going to have six years of benefits in that first 10 years. You're rigging the numbers to make it look like it's going to be financially beneficial. It is not. Almost every estimate that I've seen of the plan as it now stands says it adds to the deficit in the long run. It does not cut it.

FACT: CBO projected Senate health bill would reduce deficit

CBO: Bill yields "a net reduction in federal deficits of $132 billion" over 10 years. From CBO's December 19 cost estimate of the Senate bill incorporating the manager's amendment:

CBO and JCT estimate that, on balance, the direct spending and revenue effects of enacting the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act incorporating the manager's amendment would yield a net reduction in federal deficits of $130 billion over the 2010-2019 period.

CBO expects bill to continue deficit reduction during decade after 2019. CBO also estimated on December 20 that the bill will continue to reduce the deficit beyond the 10-year budget window that ends in 2019 "with a total effect during that decade that is in a broad range between one-quarter percent and one-half percent of GDP."

FACT: CBO projected House health bill would reduce deficit

CBO also estimated the House bill will result in deficit reductions through 2019 and in the subsequent decade. From the November 6 CBO estimate:

According to CBO and JCT's assessment, enacting H.R. 3962 would result in a net reduction in federal budget deficits of $109 billion over the 2010-2019 period (see Table 1) [this estimate was later updated to $138 billion over the same period]. In the subsequent decade, the collective effect of its provisions would probably be slight reductions in federal budget deficits. Those estimates are all subject to substantial uncertainty.