USA TODAY US Edition

We’re replacing failed Obamacare

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Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., declined to provide an opposing view. Excerpts of his remarks Thursday on the Senate floor:

Seven years ago, Democrats imposed Obamacare on our country. By nearly any measure, it has failed and no amount of 11th hour reality-denying or buck-passing by Democrats is going to change the fact that more Americans are going to get hurt unless we do something.

We’ve long called for a better way forward, and we’ve been engaged in intensive talks on how to get there. We debated many policy proposals. We considered many different viewpoints. In the end, we found that we share many ideas about what needs to be achieved and how we can achieve it.

We agree on the need to free Americans from Obamacare’s mandates, and policies contained in the discussion draft will repeal the individual mandate so Americans are no longer forced to buy insurance they don’t need or can’t afford; we’ll repeal the employer mandate so Americans no longer see their hours and take-home pay cut by employers.

We agree on the need to improve the affordabil­ity of health insurance. Policies contained in the discussion draft will eliminate costly Obamacare taxes that are passed on to consumers, and shift power from Washington to the states so they have more flexibilit­y to provide more Americans with the kind of affordable insurance options they want.

We agree on the need to stabilize the insurance markets that are collapsing under Obamacare as well, and ultimately transition away from Obamacare’s collapsing system entirely so more Americans will not be hurt.

We also agree on the need to strengthen Medicaid, preserve access to care for patients with pre-existing conditions, and allow children to stay on their parents’ health insurance through the age of 26.

Next week, we expect the Congressio­nal Budget Office to release a score. After that, we will proceed with a robust debate and an open amendment process here on the Senate floor.

It’s time to act because Obamacare is a direct attack on the middle class, and American families deserve better than its failing status quo. They deserve better care. That’s just what we’re going to continue to work to bring them.

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