Free Republic

Wednesday during a cabinet meeting, President Donald Trump discussed the Republican’s tax bill and said the repeal of individual mandate in the bill meant Obamacare has “essentially” been repealed. Trump said, “The individual mandate is being repealed. When the individual mandate is being repealed that means Obamacare is being repealed because they get their money from the individual mandate. So the individual mandate is being repealed. So in this bill not only do we have massive tax cuts and tax reform, we have essentially repealed Obamacare. And we’ll come up with something that will be much better. Whether it’s block...

Senate Republicans have approved the repeal of ObamaCare’s individual mandate as part of their tax-cut bill, a major step forward toward ending an unpopular part of the healthcare law. “Families ought to be able to make decisions about what they want to buy and what works for them –not the government,” Sen. John Barrasso (R-Wyo.) said, hailing the accomplishment. “I believe if people don’t want to buy the Obamacare insurance, they shouldn’t have to pay a tax penalty to the IRS.” The Senate tax bill must still be reconciled with House legislation that does not include the mandate’s repeal. But...

President Trump told Republican senators Tuesday he supports two bipartisan efforts to stabilize ObamaCare's insurance markets. Trump, during a luncheon on Capitol Hill, said he supports a bill proposed by Sens. Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.) and Patty Murray (D-Wash.), that would continue key ObamaCare insurer payments. He also said he supports a bill proposed by Sens. Susan Collins (R-Maine) and Bill Nelson (D-Fla.) that would set up a reinsurance fund to help insurers cover higher-cost individuals. "He said he supports Alexander-Murray. He said, more importantly, he supports Collins-Nelson... which has widespread bipartisan support," Alexander told reporters after the lunch. Collins, who...

POTUS: "Obamacare is finished, it's dead, it's gone... There is no such thing as Obamacare anymore." https://twitter.com/FoxBusiness/status/919974555342516226

WASHINGTON — AFSCME Pres. Lee Saunders issued the following statement in response to President Trump’s decision to end vital health care subsidies under the Affordable Care Act:“With this decision, the president has ushered in the era of Trumpcare, under which Americans will have fewer coverage choices and face skyrocketing premium costs.“By sabotaging the health care system just as open enrollment is set to begin, the president has all but guaranteed that insurers will abandon the market and working families will bear the brunt of the pain.“Americans will go broke, get sicker or worse because of this decision. There is no reasonable justification...

CHICAGO—U.S. Senator Dick Durbin (D-IL) released the following statement after President Trump signed an executive order further targeting and destabilizing the Affordable Care Act:“Make no mistake—after spending nine months repeatedly trying and failing to repeal the Affordable Care Act, President Trump is sabotaging America’s health care system and hurting working families to make a political point. His tactics are well documented: President Trump issued an Executive Order instructing federal agencies not to enforce the law, cut the open enrollment period in half, cancelled television and radio ads that educated people about how to enroll for insurance, slashed funding for patient navigators...

RUSH: Something dramatic, crucial, and extraordinary has just happened, ladies and gentlemen. It just happened mere moments before this program began. The timing certainly not coincidental. It happened at the White House. It involved the president of the United States and a pen. And what happened was a first serious slice taken out of Obamacare. Despite Senator John McCain’s best efforts to thwart President Trump and preserve this boondoggle, the president’s triumphs here at this stage. BREAK TRANSCRIPT RUSH: So let’s go to the audio sound bites, you tell me what you hear. This is the signing ceremony today, executive...

President Donald Trump signed an executive order on Thursday to weaken the Obamacare law and make it easier for Americans to buy bare-bones health insurance plans, but the action faces possible legal challenges. Stymied in Congress by the failure of Senate Republicans to pass legislation to dismantle Democratic former President Barack Obama’s signature domestic policy achievement, Trump’s order marks his administration’s latest effort to undermine the law without action by lawmakers. Trump’s order gives people more access to plans that do not cover essential health benefits such as maternity and newborn care, prescription drugs, and mental health and addiction treatment....

The White House announced Thursday that President Trump is taking executive action on health care as Congress stalls on efforts to overhaul ObamaCare, calling for a plan that could let employers band together and offer coverage across state lines. An executive order Trump plans to sign Thursday morning aims to offer “alternatives” to ObamaCare plans and increase competition to bring down costs. “The time has come to give Americans the freedom to purchase health insurance across state lines, which will create a truly competitive national marketplace that will bring costs way down and provide far better care,” Trump said in...

Make no mistake: Bobby Jindal is far and away the best choice to replace Tom Price as secretary of Health and Human Services. Dan McLaughlin at NRO and Steve Berman at The Resurgent both made the case earlier this week for why President Trump would be wise to pick Jindal, whose health-care policy chops and general seriousness about good governance are undisputed. Berman notes that, among all the other candidates floated recently by Axios and Politico, “Jindal is the best qualified person to run HHS, to craft health care policy, to shepherd legislation through Congress, and to speak intelligently on...

Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., predicted Wednesday that President Trump would soon move on his own to make health insurance more affordable, after the Senate failed again this week to advance any bill to reform federal healthcare policy. Paul he has been pitching the idea of using the Employee Retirement Income Security Act to let people buy insurance across state lines. That law already allows corporations to buy insurance across state lines for their workers if they are located in several states. Paul's idea is to let individuals form associations and do the same thing, and he said Trump administration officials...

It is now clear that Republicans are incapable of giving us a free market in health insurance, so it will continue to be illegal in America to buy health insurance that doesn't cover shrinks, domestic violence counseling and HIV screening, and perhaps always shall be. But there are still other good things Republicans can do! First, for fun, Republicans ought to request a Congressional Budget Office score of Obamacare. The GOP's various replacement bills have been pilloried over their CBO scorings, showing, for example, that if given a choice, up to 20 million Americans would voluntarily choose not to buy...

Full title: "Graham-Cassidy is dead. Stop treating Obamacare like the enemy and help get Americans health coverage" We may never know how many Republicans in the U.S. Senate would have voted against the latest ill-conceived and disruptive proposal to ”repeal and replace” the Affordable Care Act. But we know the three whose public opposition kept the measure from reaching the Senate floor this week — Susan Collins of Maine, John McCain of Arizona and Rand Paul of Kentucky. Although they disagree sharply over what to do about the ACA, they all deserve the country’s thanks for stopping lawmakers from heedlessly...

Republicans decided Tuesday against bringing the Graham-Cassidy healthcare bill to the floor for a vote, a GOP aide told Business Insider, effectively killing the GOP's Obamacare repeal push for the foreseeable future. Sens. Lindsey Graham and Bill Cassidy said during a press conference with GOP Senate leaders that there were not enough votes to pass the measure. "Well to be clear, due to events under our control and not under out control, we do not have the votes," Cassidy said.

A few of the many clips of John McCain talking about Repealing & Replacing O'Care. My oh my has he changed-complete turn from years of talk!

John McCain has once again shown he has no loyalty to his party, his friends, or to his voters. In likely torpedoing what may prove Republicans’ last effort to rid the country of ObamaCare, McCain evinced the nostalgia of an old man for better times. He wants the Senate to operate as it once did, with bipartisan comity and regular order. Yes, and I’d like to return to the days when kids were addicted to twilight stickball rather than video games. Those gentler times are long gone. What we have now is a bitterly divided Congress, and country. Democrat leaders...

Sen. John McCain declared his opposition Friday to the GOP's last-ditch effort to repeal and replace "Obamacare," dealing a likely death blow to the legislation and, perhaps, to the Republican Party's years of vows to kill the program. It was the second time in three months the 81-year-old McCain emerged as the destroyer of his party's signature promise to voters. "I believe we could do better working together, Republicans and Democrats, and have not yet really tried," McCain said of the bill, co-written by Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, his best friend in the Senate, and Bill Cassidy of Louisiana....

Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) said in a statement on Friday that he will oppose the Graham-Cassidy Obamacare repeal bill. McCain’s vote against Graham-Cassidy effectively tanks renewed efforts to repeal Obamacare. McCain said in a statement: advertisement I cannot in good conscience vote for the Graham-Cassidy proposal. I believe we could do better working together, Republicans and Democrats, and have not yet really tried. Nor could I support it without knowing how much it will cost, how it will effect insurance premiums, and how many people will be helped or hurt by it. Without a full CBO score, which won’t be...

Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., on Friday said he "cannot in good conscience vote for the Graham Cassidy proposal. McCain is one of four Republican senators who are undecided on the GOP healthcare overhaul, and his opposition dealt the bill's chances a significant blow. Read his full statement below: "As I have repeatedly stressed, health care reform legislation ought to be the product of regular order in the Senate. Committees of jurisdiction should mark up legislation with input from all committee members, and send their bill to the floor for debate and amendment. That is the only way we might achieve...

Who's right — President Donald Trump and Sen. Bill Cassidy, or late-night host Jimmy Kimmel? None has really captured the complexity of the debate over who might lose insurance protections in the latest Republican health care bill. But of the three, the TV guy is the hardest to refute.