There is a long list of failures related to the Obamacare system. With that in mind, Trump promised Tuesday that if elected, he would replace the healthcare system with something more effectual.
While on the campaign trail, the Republican presidential candidate announced to a crowd in Forge, Pa. once he is elected, he will call upon Congress for special session to immediately start working on a reform law to repair the country’s healthcare industry.
“When we win on Nov. 8, and elect a Republican Congress, we will be able to immediately repeal and replace Obamacare,” said Trump, who was introduced by former GOP candidate Ben Carson. “We have to do it. I will ask Congress to convene a special session so we can repeal and replace, and it will be such an honor for me, for you, and for everybody in this country because Obamacare has to be replaced, and we will do it, and we will do it very, very quickly. It’s a catastrophe.”
Then Trump was quick to point out how Obama lied to the public and Democrats when “selling” the healthcare act. President Obama stated that if people liked their plans and their doctors, they would be able to keep them. However, that has not been the case and “may go down as one of the great political lies of the century,” according to Trump.
He also pointed out how confusing the 2,700-page healthcare bill is and he said that to this day, “nobody understands it.”
But, now even the White House has admitted premiums are going to increase significantly.
“The Obama administration has just announced massive double-digit and triple-digit Obamacare premium hikes everywhere, all throughout the country,” said Trump. “Here in Pennsylvania, premiums are going to increase more than 60 percent, and that’s nothing compared what will happen in the future. Of course in the future, if I’m president, there won’t be Obamacare, so you don’t have to worry about it.”
Even with these numbers, Jonathan Gruber, an Obamacare architect recently said that the system is working just fine. “There’s no sense in which it needs to be fixed,” said Gruber to CNN’s Carol Costello. “The law is working as designed. However, it could work better.”
Raising premiums was always the plan, then? Isn’t it supposed to be “affordable?”
In some states, like Arizona, premiums are expected to raise much more than 60% with insanely high deductibles raging from $12,000-15,000.
“In other words, your healthcare won’t even be usable,” said Trump. “Paying all this money, you won’t even get to use it. People all across the country are devastated. In many instances their healthcare costs are more than their mortgage costs or their rent, which by the way is a first in American history. This is particularly unfair to millennials, and younger Americans generally, who will be totally crushed by massive healthcare costs before they even get started on their journey through life.”
So what is Trump’s solution that he will present to Congress? The plan includes “health savings accounts, a nationwide insurance market where you can purchase across state lines and letting states manage Medicaid dollars.” It will also give back some of the power to families. “Parents can make the healthcare decisions that they really want to make for their families. It will be a much better healthcare at a much less cost.”
If Clinton is elected, this failing system will only continue. Pence reminded the crowd at the event Tuesday that the system was formerly referred to as “Hillarycare” and that Republicans were right all along when they were against it from the beginning.
“Every single one opposed it. And I’m also proud that since 2010 Republicans in Congress have been united and continue to work each and every day to replace Obamacare with free market healthcare solutions that will work for the American people,” said Pence. “The truth is premiums for employer plans have gone up by almost $5,000 since President Obama took office and last week the Obama administration announced, and this is almost breath-taking to think about it, the Obama administration announced that the average premiums under Obamacare exchanges are going to go up 25 percent on average across the country.”