President Donald Trump rode to the White House making big promises on health care — pledges that he is now in serious danger of breaking. Let’s look at how the president’s words on the campaign trail stack up against what we know today.
In addition to Trump’s comments on the stump, his administration has spent weeks raising expectations on its Obamacare replacement. Among the claims: The Republican plan would cover more people, reduce their premiums and costs, avoid cutting Medicaid, and leave no one worse off than under the former president’s signature achievement.
So now that the House GOP’s American Health Care Act (AHCA) is here, how do these pledges look?
Not good, according to an analysis from the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office released on Monday. The report found the House plan — which the Trump administration has thrown its support behind — would cause millions to lose insurance and raise costs for vulnerable populations.
The White House pushed back against the report, claiming the findings were not accurate, but some independent analysts have made similar predictions. Here’s a look at where we are:
COVERAGE
“We’re going to have insurance for everybody”— Donald Trump, Washington Post interview, 01/15/2017
Trump was clear both as a candidate and as president: No one would be left behind under his health care plan.
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“We’re gonna come up with a new plan that’s going to be better health care for more people at a lesser cost,” Trump told ABC’s David Muir in January. “Everybody’s got to be covered,” he said on CBS’ “60 Minutes” in 2015.
In addition to Trump’s comments, the House GOP website denies that people will lose coverage under the Republican bill and Office of Management and Budget director Mick Mulvaney told CBS News last week he believed the legislation “will cover more” people. “We don’t want anyone who currently has insurance to not have insurance,” White House counselor Kellyanne Conway said on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe” in January.
The House bill would fall far short of these promises, according to the CBO.
By the agency’s estimate, 14 million fewer people would be insured in 2018 versus current law and a whopping 24 million fewer people would have insurance in 2026.
Some people would voluntarily drop their coverage because the bill repeals the individual mandate that requires people to buy insurance, but others “would forgo insurance in response to higher premiums.”
The coverage losses would be “disproportionately larger among older people with lower income,” according to the CBO, who would face higher premiums under the House GOP bill and less federal aid to pay for them.
COSTS
“I firmly believe that nobody will be worse off financially in the process that we’re going through” — Health and Human Services Secretary Tom Price, NBC’s “Meet The Press,” 03/12/2017
Trump and his allies emphasized affordability, saying their Obamacare replacement would lower premiums and provide more help for out-of-pocket costs.
Trump, for example, told the Washington Post that Americans would see “much lower deductibles” in January and complained on Monday that under the current system “deductibles are so high you don’t even get to use [insurance].” He promised “great health care for a fraction of the price” in a speech in Las Vegas last year.
