The plan Donald Trump and the GOP released to dismantle “Obamacare,” the Affordable Care Act, will increase the projected number of people without health insurance by 14 million next year and by 23 million in 2026, the Congressional Budget Office reported Wednesday. The long-awaited “CBO report” you’ve been hearing about in the news was finally released today, weeks after The American Health Care Act, or “Trumpcare,” narrowly passed the House. The 10-year figure of 23 million people losing their insurance coverage is slightly less than originally estimated, but still completely insane.
Trumpcare would reduce the federal deficit by $119 billion over a decade, which is lower than the original projection of $150 billion in savings projected in late March for the earlier iteration of AHCA. So, more people suffer, and Trump’s break for the rich doesn’t even come with the promised deficit reduction.
“I don’t know how we get to 50 at the moment,” Republican Senator Mitch McConnell told Reuters on Wednesday. “But that’s the goal.”
President Trump reacts to the AHCA health care bill being pulled by Congressional Republicans before a vote as he appears with Secretary of Health and Human Services Tom Price (L) and Vice President Mike Pence (R) in the Oval Office of the White House in Washington, U.S., March 24, 2017. REUTERS
In the New York Times report on today’s CBO score, a reminder of how Democrats are being overtly excluded from the process of hashing out the changes to America’s health care:
Senate Republican have been meeting several days a week, trying to thrash out their differences on complex questions of health policy and politics, like the future of Medicaid.
Asked why Democrats had been excluded, Mr. McConnell said, “We’re not going to waste our time talking to people that have no interest in fixing the problem.”
Democrats have said they would gladly work with Republicans if the Republicans would renounce their goal of repealing Mr. Obama’s health care law.
C.B.O. Projects Dismantling Obamacare Increases Uninsured by 23 Million In a Decade [NYT]
PHOTO, TOP: U.S. President Donald Trump speaks with House Freedom Caucus Chairman Mark Meadows (L) and House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R) behind him as Trump gathered with Congressional Republicans in the Rose Garden of the White House after the House of Representatives approved the American Healthcare Act, to repeal major parts of Obamacare and replace it with the Republican healthcare plan, in Washington, U.S., May 4, 2017. REUTERS/Carlos Barria