Following Donald Trump’s victory in November, we were promised that congressional Republicans would have an Obamacare repeal bill on Trump’s desk on day one.
Clearly there’s been a bit of a delay there, as we didn’t actually get a bill proposed until March, and that bill amounted to nothing more than “Obamacare-lite.” The same congressional Republicans who voted countless times to repeal Obamacare while Obama was President, all of a sudden, couldn’t muster the votes to pass a health care reform bill, and the vote was canceled.
A month has passed since then – so will we finally see any attempt at repealing Obamacare? It’s amazing that when there was a Democrat president to block any repeal attempts, Republican congressmen were more than happy to vote through any repeal bill, but when a Republican holds the presidency, all of a sudden they can’t get their act together? Were their prior attempts merely a symbolic attack on Obama?
Let’s hope not.
The House Freedom Caucus has officially endorsed a revised Republican plan Wednesday to repeal and replace Obamacare, delivering a fresh burst of momentum to the GOP’s efforts to revive its stalled health care effort.
“While the revised version still does not fully repeal Obamacare, we are prepared to support it to keep our promise to the American people to lower healthcare costs,” the Freedom Caucus said in a statement. “We look forward to working with our Senate colleagues to improve the bill.”
H/T: Politico
A number of conservative advocacy groups that opposed last month’s repeal attempt have expressed support for this particular attempt.
David McIntire, president of Club or Growth, noted that while this is short of a full repeal, it would at least give states the option to opt out of Obamacare’s costliest regulations (which would improve healthcare costs). FreedomWorks also endorsed this proposal.
The new health care language allows states to opt out of central Obamacare protections for consumers — as long as the states offer an alternative proposal that lowers premiums, increases the ranks of insured people or stokes greater competition among health insurance companies.
The plan prohibits insurers from charging women higher premiums than men and retains Obamacare’s guarantee of “access” to coverage for people with pre-existing conditions. But it also allows states to waive Obamacare’s prohibition on charging sick people higher premiums, and states can also pull back from Obamacare’s set of minimum insurance benefits.
It’s better than nothing, and at least weakens Obamacare – but what do they have to fear about a complete repeal? In answer to the concern of what Obamacare will be replaced with – when a firefighter puts out a fire, do you think he ponders what it’ll be replaced with? Of course not. The very thought is ridiculous.
What do you think? Should Congress vote to pass this bill, or vote it down until we get a real repeal?
