Here’s a pair of handy rules of thumb to know we’re heading into a major election cycle: (1) Republican candidates start talking about the need to repeal the Affordable Care Act, and (2) none of them bothers to say how that will make American healthcare better.
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That might be worthwhile, if it were not just blather. The truth, of course, is that Haley’s Republican colleagues have had all the opportunities they needed to do exactly what she claimed to advocate, and did exactly none of it.
To take just one example, in August 2022, legislation to allow Medicare to negotiate the prices of its most-prescribed drugs with their manufacturers came before the Senate and House. How many Republican senators and representatives voted for it? Exactly zero. It was passed with Democratic votes and signed by President Biden, and is now the law of the land.
A couple of things are clear about this emerging Republican position on the Affordable Care Act and on U.S. healthcare more generally: They don’t have a clue about what to do with it. That doesn’t matter, because they have no intention about doing anything. They’re just gaslighting the public.
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Since its enactment, the program has built up a sizable head of steam in popularity. Adult Americans had a favorable view of Obamacare by a 59%-40% margin, according to a May tracking poll by the Kaiser Family Foundation (KFF).
The program has consistently gained in popularity since December 2016, the poll showed; 89% of Democrats and 62% of independent voters favored the program, while only 26% of Republicans viewed it favorably — a clue to why GOP candidates have dusted off their attacks.
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Without a replacement healthcare program — which the Republicans have never proposed — the old system in which health plans in the individual market were empowered to reject coverage for people with preexisting conditions or charge them inflated premiums would return.
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If Obamacare were repealed, those 21 million Americans covered by the Medicaid expansion would lose their coverage. As many as 2.3 million people younger than 26 might be thrown off their parents’ health plans.
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If Trump, DeSantis and Haley devoted any thought to America’s healthcare landscape, they would stop talking about repealing and “supplanting” the ACA and come up with concrete suggestions to make it better. Instead, they wield their attacks on Obamacare like shibboleths.
They’re the easiest way to excite the MAGA base without actually doing anything. All they’ve proven is the old adage that talk is cheap.
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