Divisive, rushed bill crafted in secret
When Republicans campaigned last year on a pledge to “repeal and replace Obamacare,” they failed to add, as become obvious on Thursday, “with something just as flawed.”
Senate Republican leaders released their draft of the much-anticipated revision of the health-care law after crafting their plan behind closed doors — and ignoring the concerns of governors and other stakeholders — in order to rush through a vote in time to go home for their July 4 recess.
Senators want fireworks? They’ll see them. The health and well-being of millions of American depend on Congress getting this right. Instead the Senate GOP plan trades one divisive, partisan and ill-vetted health-care overhaul for another.
No one suggests the Affordable Care Act could not be dramatically improved. Parts of it were economically unworkable, but it is the uncertainty created by the impending Republican repeal that has accelerated the exodus of insurance companies from participating; in as many as 20 of Ohio’s 88 counties, residents won’t have a single insurer willing to sell to them a plan on the exchange in 2018.
What the Affordable Care Act did accomplish, and spectacularly, was to establish the expectation that all Americans have a right to accessible and affordable health care. The ACA has proven to be neither for many, but Republicans did promise to come up with something better.
The GOP plan unveiled on Thursday is deeply flawed. It makes cut to Medicaid, phasing out the program’s expansion by 2024 to reduce the federal government’s costly commitment. It is that expansion that did the heavy lifting of the ACA, expanding coverage to 11 million low-income Americans in 31 states. Of the 700,000 Ohioans who received health care under the Medicaid expansion, 200,000 received treatment for opioid addiction; the GOP replacement would take away a crucial tool states need to fight this deadly plague and save lives.
The Senate bill also repeals most of the taxes approved in 2010 to raise money to fund the Obamacare health-care expansion, and it effectively abolishes the ACA’s mandate for the uninsured to buy coverage. Like the House version, The Washington Post reports, the Senate bill gives “the wealthy an enormous tax cut, financed (relative to current law) largely by hundreds of billions in cuts to health-care spending on poor people.”
This health-care overhaul would impact a sector that makes up one-sixth of the American economy and millions of lives. The country needs a reasonable compromise. Instead the GOP Senate leaders hatched a hasty plan in secret and are pushing to pass it under such a short time frame that it will allow little time for scrutiny or comment.
But comment is indeed coming in, fast and furious, from Democrats. Ohio Sen. Sherrod Brown said, “This bill takes away the number one tool we have in the fight against opioids — Medicaid treatment. We cannot allow Washington to rip the rug out from under Ohio communities.”
Hawaii Sen. Mazie K. Hirono, a Democrat, was succinct: “Trumpcare sends a simple message: You’re on your own.”
The GOP will live with the legacy of this bill for decades to come. After years of whining, is this the best they can do? A replacement plan should improve affordability, restore certainty and stability to the insurance markets, encourage innovation and thin regulations. And it should be done with full transparency and open debate to ensure a sustainable and successful reform.