President Donald Trump’s proposed federal cuts would have devastating repercussions in the areas of healthcare and health research, and deep economic consequences in New Jersey, home to the world’s largest pharmaceutical companies.

Trump relies on another billionaire, Elon Musk, to chainsaw $880 billion from the Energy and Commerce Committee, mostly coming from Medicaid. The main government program covering health care insurance and long-term care, Medicaid covers approximately 83 million Americans. According to the Kaiser Family Foundation (KFF), Medicaid spending accounts for one-fifth of health care spending, more than half of spending for long-term care and a large share of state budgets.

Real people will get hurt, and the Trump-saddled GOP knows it.

Dr. Monica Driscoll, a molecular biologist and biochemist who specializes in neuro-degenerative disease research, said, “I love the way the U.S. has done science – at least in the past.”

But now, “I am stunned and devastated by this government-mediated dismantling of an incredibly successful scientific enterprise,” she said, in a packed general-purpose room in the Life Sciences Building on the Busch Campus.

In the coming days and months, as Musk – under Trump’s command – cuts loose, the New Jersey leaders on this list below will continue to find themselves embroiled, facing consequences weightier than who wins or loses an intellectual debate, and more along the lines of who can help Musk start up or shut down his runaway, flailing chainsaw.

InsiderNJ has published this Healthcare Powerlist as a way of showcasing some of the key players in New Jersey’s complex healthcare policy, practice, and industrial landscape.

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