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The Affordable Care Act (ACA or “Obamacare”)
was signed into law by President Barack Obama in 2010. A major overhaul of the
U.S. health-care system, Obamacare aims to reduce the amount of uncompensated
care the average U.S. family pays for by requiring everyone to have health
insurance or pay a tax penalty. Recently, Obamacare has seen some changes from
our new president. Read on to see what has changed and how this may affect you.
February 28, 2018
https://www.ehealthinsurance.com/resources/affordable-care-act/understanding-obamacare
-- 2014 --
Undated: 33 million people in the United
States (10.4% of the US population) did not have health insurance in 2014
according to the US Census Bureau. The United States, Greece, and Poland are the
only countries of the 34 members of the Organization for Economic Co-operation
and Development (OECD) that do not have universal health care.
https://healthcare.procon.org/
January 22:
What are the pros and cons
of a “single payer” system?
https://www.brookings.edu/blog/up-front/2014/01/22/can-canadian-style-healthcare-work-in-america-vermont-thinks-so/
August 25: ... federal law [ACA/Obamacare] prohibits health
insurance companies from discriminating against transgender people, and it bars
insurers from denying coverage based on pre-existing conditions. That makes it
possible for more transgender people to purchase private plans.
http://www.thedailybeast.com/obamacare-now-pays-for-gender-reassignment
-- 2015 --
June 16: [Trump On the future of the Affordable Care Act]: “Remember, Obamacare
really kicks in in ‘16. 2016. Obama’s gonna be out playing golf. He might even
be on one of my courses. I would invite him, I actually would say it. I have the
best courses in the world so I’d say, you know what if he wants to. I have one
right next to the White House. Right on the Potomac. If he’d like to play,
that’s fine. In fact, I’d love him to leave early and play.”
http://www.politico.com/story/2015/06/donald-trump-2016-announcement-10-best-lines-119066
September 22:
Despite some dire predictions, Obamacare
isn't having much of an impact on hiring by businesses so far, according to a
new study.
Employers with at least 100 full-time workers must offer health insurance to
full-time employees who work 30 or more hours a week or pay a penalty, as of
this year. This mandate will start applying to smaller companies with 50 or more
full-timers in 2016.
But few employers report changing their staffing or hiring because of Obamacare,
according to the 2015
Kaiser Family Foundation/Health Research & Education Trust survey, released
Tuesday.
Only 4% of employers with at least 50 full-time workers said they shifted some
staffers from full-time to part-time schedules so that they wouldn't qualify for
health care. And another 4% said they were reducing the number of full-time
employees they planned to hire because of the cost of health benefits.
"Despite all the debate about the so-called employer mandate...the actual
employer response does not match the rhetoric," said Drew Altman, the
foundation's president. "It's muted. It's modest. It cuts in different
directions with no big shift to part-time employment."
http://money.cnn.com/2015/09/22/news/economy/employers-obamacare-jobs/?iid=EL
-- 2016 --
August 17: This brief explains three
provisions of the ACA – risk adjustment, reinsurance, and risk corridors – that
were intended to promote insurer competition on the basis of quality and value
and promote insurance market stability, particularly in the early years of
reform. [See March 23, 2017 Marco Rubio]
https://www.kff.org/health-reform/issue-brief/explaining-health-care-reform-risk-adjustment-reinsurance-and-risk-corridors/
December 5: Risk corridors program -- The
Obama administration is now on the hook for more than $8 billion in payments to
cover insurer losses on the health insurance exchanges, but industry experts are
growing doubtful the full tab will ever be paid.
At the same time, while Republican lawmakers are committed to sewing up the
federal wallet to keep the current administration from paying insurers what they
call a “bailout,”
they don't want to see the insurance markets collapse under their watch. Any
replacement plan for the Affordable Care Act—which President-elect Donald Trump
and Republicans in Congress have vowed to
repeal and replace—would require private insurers to jump on board. And
alienating them by refusing to pay promised funds would be bad for business,
experts say.
http://www.modernhealthcare.com/article/20161205/NEWS/161129937
Undated:
Gender Reassignment Surgery - What Does Your Plan
Cover? Types of care likely to be covered
include mental health counseling, hormone replacement therapy, and organ removal
(orchiectomy, hysterectomy/ oophorectomy). Gender confirmation surgeries and
procedures such as electrolysis may or may not be covered, depending on the
plan.
http://forwardtogether.org/transgender-healthcare?gclid=CLjR4oj1z9QCFdi1wAodwPILGA
December 14:
Mindful of the clock ticking down to a
Trump presidency, the Obama administration issued a final rule on
Wednesday to bar states from withholding federal family-planning funds from
Planned Parenthood affiliates and other health clinics that provide
abortions.
https://www.nytimes.com/2016/12/14/us/politics/obama-administration-planned-parenthood.html
December 31:
A federal judge in Texas on Saturday issued a court order barring enforcement of
an Obama administration policy seeking to extend anti-discrimination protections
under the Affordable Care Act to transgender health and abortion-related
services.
"Today's decision is a setback, but
hopefully a temporary one, since all Americans - regardless of their sex, gender
identity or sexual orientation - should have access to quality, affordable
health care free from discrimination ..."
... the U.S. Supreme Court in 2012 and 2015 issued rulings that
kept the Affordable Care Act, [Obama's] top legislative achievement, intact.
http://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-obamacare-idUSKBN14L0OP
-- 2017 --
Undated: Many health plans are still using
exclusions such as “services related to sex change” or “sex reassignment
surgery” to deny coverage to transgender people for certain health care
services. Coverage varies by state.
... transgender health insurance
exclusions may be unlawful sex discrimination. The health care law prohibits
discrimination on the basis of sex, among other bases, in certain health
programs and activities.
https://www.healthcare.gov/transgender-health-care/
Undated: ObamaCare
does a lot to help equality of all genders and income levels, but there is no
specific anti-discrimination law that protects transgender Americans. Check out
the list of insurers ... and make sure to understand the insurers rules for
transgender health coverage.
https://obamacarefacts.com/questions/is-there-transgender-health-coverage/
January 23: Donald Trump ran a campaign that
pledged to get rid of Obamacare.
But his administration will have to either defend the controversial law in
federal court or fork over tens of millions of dollars to angry insurers.
Several insurers took the Obama administration to court in the fall to force the
administration to pay out money they say was promised to them. Those lawsuits
won't likely be resolved by the time Trump takes office on Jan. 20, meaning he
will have to settle them or fight for a law he wants to repeal.
The idea was promoted by the Obama administration as a way to ensure
predictability for insurers that had no idea who was going to sign up for
Obamacare in 2014. However, it didn't work out like that.
Too many insurers requested payments from the federal government and not enough
paid in to the program to cover the payments in 2014. The result was a major
shortfall, with $2.87 billion in requested payments for 2014 but insurers
receiving $362 million.
Jost and Holtz-Eakin said they doubted that repealing Obamacare, which likely
won't go into effect for a few years until a GOP replacement is approved, would
affect the lawsuits.
"I think the suits are relative to the law at the time," Holtz-Eakin said.
http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/obamacare-lawsuits-put-trump-in-awkward-place/article/2610652
January 26: Trump administration ... kills
Obamacare ads for HealthCare.gov with less than week to go in open enrollment
https://www.cnbc.com/2017/01/26/trump-administration-kills-obamacare-ads-for-healthcaregov.html
February 23: Former House Speaker John
Boehner predicted on Thursday that a full repeal and replace of Obamacare is
“not what’s going to happen” and that Republicans will instead just make some
fixes to the health care law.
Boehner, who retired in 2015 amid unrest among conservatives, said at an Orlando
healthcare conference that GOP lawmakers were too optimistic in their talk of
quickly repealing and then replacing Obamacare.
"All this happy talk that went on in November and December and January about
repeal, repeal, repeal -- yeah we'll do replace, replace -- I started
laughing because if you pass repeal without replace, first, anything that
happens is your fault. You broke it."
http://www.politico.com/story/2017/02/john-boehner-obamacare-republicans-235303
February 24: Support for Obamacare is at an all-time high,
according to two surveys released this week as Republican leaders continue to
press the case for repeal amid fierce resistance at many town halls.
http://www.cnn.com/2017/02/24/politics/pew-survey-obamacare-support-record-high/index.html
February 27:
March 6: The legislation that House Republicans have unveiled to repeal and replace
ObamaCare would eliminate nearly all of the 2010 health law's taxes — with one
key exception.
The House bill, unveiled Monday evening, would allow ObamaCare's "Cadillac"
tax on high-cost health plans to take effect in 2025. The tax, which has been
opposed by both Democrats and Republicans, had been slated to take effect in
2020 under current law.
http://thehill.com/policy/finance/322625-house-gop-bill-would-repeal-obamacare-taxes
March 9: “The number of women of reproductive age who were uninsured
dropped by a third between 2013 and 2015,” Adam Sonfield, a senior policy
manager of the Guttmacher Institute, explained ...
“Our abortion rate is the lowest it’s been for decades, and
[we’ve also seen] lower pregnancy rates for teenagers. Across the board, all
positive changes.”
http://allaboveall.org/announcement/good-luck-women-under-the-gop-health-care-bill-itll-be-tougher-to-have-a-baby-and-tougher-not-to/
March 23: Well before midnight ... Republicans still had no deal on their
health care bill to repeal Obamacare, as a Thursday vote loomed around the
corner.
http://www.cnn.com/2017/03/22/politics/house-health-care-bill/
March 23: Who knew health care was so
complicated? The 535 members of the 111th congress, and all of their aides, who
spent nearly a full year drafting the Affordable Care Act, that's who.
[Unfortunately for the ACA, the risk corridors program was intentionally damaged
by Marco Rubio]:
[The Marco Rubio] amendment placed a hard limit on risk corridor payments,
thus restoring the risk to insurers that the risk corridor policy was designed
to mitigate. More than anything else, it was this single act that caused
insurers to "flee the exchanges", especially in those states that did not expand
Medicaid.
... Rubio bragged about this action of his during the Republican Presidential
debates, calling risk corridors a "bailout
fund" for the insurers.
So when you hear that "Obamacare is on life support, and we're pulling the
plug," remember that it was Republican partisanship that put it there.
https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2017/3/23/1646512/-Risk-Corridors-or-How-Marco-Rubio-Broke-Obamacare
March 28:
Obamacare has dodged another bullet!
... Obamacare survived: What
all this means for you ...
http://www.brownellinsurance.com/tag/obamacare/
March 28: There's one thing [congress] can do that will likely drive a
stake through [the heart of the Affordable Care Act] -- refuse to fund the
law's cost-sharing subsidies. The
subsidies continue to be paid this year, but insurers want to know whether
lawmakers intend to fund them for 2018. If they don't, many, if not all,
carriers would likely drop out of the exchanges next year.
http://money.cnn.com/2017/03/28/news/economy/obamacare-congress/index.html
March 24: After withdrawing
his health care bill from the House floor in an embarrassing defeat, Speaker
Paul Ryan said Friday that “Obamacare is the law of the land” and will remain so
“for the foreseeable future.”
“I don't know what else to say other than Obamacare is the law of the land,”
Ryan told reporters shortly after House Republicans canceled a planned afternoon
vote on their alternative to Barack Obama’s 2010 health care reform law.
“It's gonna remain the law of the land until it's replaced,” Ryan
continued. “We did not have quite the votes to replace this law."
https://www.politico.com/story/2017/03/obamacare-repeal-failed-paul-ryan-reaction-236478
March 27: President Trump is serious about working with Democrats to move his
agenda forward and has already fielded phone calls from liberal lawmakers about
healthcare reform, White House spokesman Sean Spicer said Monday.
http://thehill.com/homenews/administration/325944-white-house-trump-is-serious-about-working-with-democrats
March 30: House Speaker Paul Ryan says he has no interest in working with
Democrats on getting health care legislation passed
Donald Trump is "absolutely" willing to work with Democrats on a way
forward on health care.
http://www.cnn.com/2017/03/30/politics/paul-ryan-democrats-health-care/index.html
March 30: Speaker
Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) said Thursday that the administration will
continue to fund key ObamaCare payments to insurers while a House lawsuit runs
its course ... House Republicans sued the Obama administration over these
"cost-sharing reductions," or CSRs, which reimburse insurers for giving
discounted deductibles to low-income ObamaCare enrollees. ... Insurers are
worried the payments could be discontinued, which could throw the market into
chaos and cause insurers to pull out of the marketplaces.
http://thehill.com/policy/healthcare/326533-ryan-says-key-obamacare-payments-will-continue-during-house-lawsuit
March 30: [House Democratic leader Nancy]
Pelosi warns GOP against 'sabotaging' Obamacare, as House Speaker Ryan vows to
press repeal
Pelosi said individual health plan premiums and deductibles could increase
dramatically, by 35 percent to 40 percent above current levels, if the
Republicans did two things to "sabotage" Obamacare.
One would be killing the ACA mandate that most Americans have insurance or pay a
fine. The second would be if GOP lawmakers refuse to continue funding subsidies
to insurers that lower out-of-pocket costs for millions of Americans.
https://www.cnbc.com/2017/03/30/pelosi-warns-against-sabotaging-obamacare-ryan-vows-to-press-repeal.html
April 12: President Donald Trump is threatening not to reimburse health
insurers for covering low income people as a way of forcing Democrats to the
negotiating table on health care.
http://www.greensborotimesonline.com/posts/trump-threatens-to-stop-insurance-payments/
March 30: Trump predicted
Monday that Democrats will ultimately collaborate with Republicans on
healthcare once ObamaCare starts failing.
“The Democrats will make a deal with me on healthcare as soon as ObamaCare
folds — not long,” he tweeted. "Do not worry, we are in very good shape!”
http://thehill.com/homenews/senate/326466-gop-senator-jabs-ryan-on-dems-healthcare
April 13: Aetna considers
gender reassignment surgery medically necessary when [certain] criteria are met
...
http://www.aetna.com/cpb/medical/data/600_699/0615.html
April 13:
President Trump signed legislation on Thursday aimed at cutting off
federal funding to Planned Parenthood and other groups that perform
abortions, a move cheered by conservatives who have clamored to impose curbs on
reproductive rights [after Obama ruled that such clinics be funded].
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/04/13/us/politics/planned-parenthood-trump.html
April 26: With just two days left to stop a partial shutdown of the
federal government, the Trump administration on Wednesday removed another major
sticking point in the spending bill negotiations.
The White House told lawmakers it will not cut off federal subsidies that help
low-income Americans pay for health insurance under the Affordable Care Act, at
least for now, an administration official and congressional sources confirm to
NPR.
http://www.npr.org/2017/04/26/525784529/easing-shutdown-worries-trump-relents-on-another-major-hurdle?utm_source=npr_newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_content=20170426&utm_campaign=breakingnews&utm_term=nprnews
April 28: House GOP leaders, despite a furious push
Thursday, were unable to wrangle the votes necessary to move forward on their
latest effort to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act.
The development short-circuits, yet again, the House effort to repeal the
cornerstone domestic achievement of President Barack Obama. It guarantees
President Donald Trump will be without a cornerstone legislative achievement
on his 100th day in office -- a symbolic moment that the White House has
focused on intently in recent days ...
http://www.cnn.com/2017/04/25/politics/shutdown-border-wall-obamacare-congress/index.html
May 4: House Republicans pass healthcare
bill in first step toward replacing Obamacare ...
Partisan approval with one vote to spare sends American Health Care Act to
uncertain fate in Senate, after negotiations reveal cracks in Republican party
...
Republicans burst into applause when the bill passed the 216-vote threshold, a
feat that had seemed insurmountable just days before.
Democrats too saw a reason for celebrating. After it passed, they sang the 60s
hit Na Na Hey Hey (Kiss Him Goodbye) – appearing to suggest Republicans would
lose their seats if the repeal proved unpopular.
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017/may/04/republican-healthcare-bill-passes-house-vote-obamacare-repeal
May 24: Latest poll: a majority oppose the
Republican plan to replace Obamacare.
http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2017/05/24/fox-news-poll-trump-approval-down-voters-support-special-counsel-on-russia.html
May 26: Today, more than 17 million women in
the U.S. aged 18 to 64 have health insurance because of Medicaid, according to
data from the National Women’s Law Center. Nearly a fourth of these women gained
access to health insurance for the first time as a result of
Medicaid expansion under the Affordable Care Act (ACA) that passed in 2010.
http://abcnews.go.com/Health/gops-proposed-medicaid-cuts-leave-millions-women-uninsured/story?id=47667870
June 6: Sen. Lindsey Graham, a South
Carolina Republican who recently met with Trump, told CNN on Monday that he
didn't think health care reform will get passed by the Senate this year.
"I just don't think we put it together among ourselves," he said. "I've always
believed, let Obamacare collapse, which it will and challenge the Democrats to
help us fix it. That's always been my preferred route."
http://www.cnn.com/2017/06/06/politics/trump-agenda-russia-congress/index.html
June 22: The closely guarded Senate health
care bill written entirely behind closed doors finally
became public Thursday in a do-or-die moment for the Republican Party's
winding efforts to repeal Obamacare.
With the exception of some key
changes -- notably keeping Obamacare's subsidies to help people pay for
individual coverage -- the bill is similar to the version of the House measure
that passed last month which Trump has since called "mean" despite having a Rose
Garden celebration with House Republicans.
http://us.cnn.com/2017/06/22/politics/senate-health-care-bill/?iid=ob_lockedrail_bottomlist
June 28: Just 12% of Americans support the
Senate Republican health care plan, a new USA TODAY/Suffolk University Poll
finds, amid a roiling debate over whether the GOP will deliver on its signature
promise to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act.
[In a survey] taken Saturday
through Tuesday, a 53% majority say Congress should either leave the law known
as Obamacare alone or work to fix its problems while keeping its framework
intact.
https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2017/06/28/suffolk-poll-obamacare-trump-senate-health-care-plan/103249346/
June 28: By more than 4-1, those surveyed
trust congressional Democrats over congressional Republicans to protect the
interests of them and their families on health care, 43%-10%. Another 19% say
they trust President Trump most. The president's ratings on handling health care
far lags his standing on other issues, including the economy and national
security. Twenty-seven percent approve of the job he's doing on health care; 61%
disapprove.
https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2017/06/28/suffolk-poll-obamacare-trump-senate-health-care-plan/103249346/
July 6: Republicans are starting to admit
they may have to work with Democrats on healthcare
http://www.businessinsider.com/mcconnell-republican-democrats-healthcare-bill-senate-2017-7
July 18: POTUS said he
was "disappointed" about healthcare.
He also said his plan was now "to let Obamacare fail, it will be a lot easier.
And I think we're probably in that position where we'll let Obamacare fail.
We're not going to own it. I'm not going to own it. I can tell you the
Republicans are not going to own it. We'll let Obamacare fail and then the
Democrats are going to come to us."
https://www.vox.com/2017/7/18/15990986/trump-let-obamacare-fail
July 19: New Jersey Sen. Cory Booker slammed
President Donald Trump for declaring he would let Obamacare fail ...
... during the 2016 election, Trump promised voters that only he could fix
health care in America, but he outsourced responsibility to the Republican
leadership.
"The great deal maker failed to make a deal," Booker said. "And so now he's just
saying I am going to imperil 30 million Americans ... you will see very
devastating things happen. That's just not a cynical way that's violating his
promises, that's sinister. It's evil to plot against Americans like that."
http://www.phillytrib.com/news/trump-letting-obamacare-fail-is-cynical-and-sinister-sen-cory/article_b859831c-6859-576a-9167-99f1b5ecabae.html
July 27: As of Thursday afternoon, the text
of the Republican bill that would scrap Obamacare's individual and employer
mandates -- known as the "skinny repeal" bill -- remained unseen by senators but
it was discussed during a closed-door lunch and an outline of it has been
circulating among lawmakers and lobbyists.
Rep. Mark Meadows, leader of the
House Freedom Caucus: "Am I gonna send a skinny health care plan to the
President for him to sign? The answer is absolutely not"...
http://www.cnn.com/2017/07/27/politics/health-care-debate-thursday/index.html
July 27: The Senate is expected to kick off
a marathon of voting on health care amendments — known as a vote-a-rama — at
some point Thursday or Friday before getting down to final passage of a health
care bill.
The Senate defines it [a vote-a-rama] as 15 or more votes
that happen on a piece of legislation in a single day (while vote-a-ramas are
often done on budget resolutions, they can be about any piece of legislation,
like the health care bill). After the allotted time of debate on a bill expires,
any senator can introduce an unlimited number of amendments to a piece of
legislation. They then vote on the amendments, marathon-style. This can go on
for hours.
https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/onpolitics/2017/07/27/vote-a-rama-senate-health-care-bill/515819001/
July 28: In a 2 a.m. tweet on Friday, after
the Senate failed to pass the so-called "skinny" health care bill, President
Trump said, " 3 Republicans and 48 Democrats let the American people down. As I
said from the beginning, let ObamaCare implode, then deal. Watch!"
https://www.cnsnews.com/news/article/susan-jones/trump-3-republicans-and-48-democrats-let-american-people-down
July 30: A coalition of roughly 40 House
Republicans and Democrats plan to unveil a slate of Obamacare fixes Monday they
hope will gain traction after the Senate’s effort to repeal the law imploded.
The Problem Solvers caucus, led by Tom Reed (R-N.Y.) and Josh Gottheimer (D-N.J.),
is fronting the effort to stabilize the ACA markets, according to multiple
sources. But other centrist members, including Rep. Kurt Schrader (D-Ore.), and
several other lawmakers from the New Democrat Coalition and the GOP’s moderate
Tuesday Group are also involved.
Their plan focuses on immediately stabilizing the insurance market and then
pushing for Obamacare changes that have received bipartisan backing in the past.
https://www.politico.com/story/2017/07/30/obamacare-health-care-stabilization-241151
August 7: [Insurer] Anthem (ANTM)
is pulling out of Nevada's Obamacare exchange for 2018 and cutting its presence
in Georgia's marketplace roughly in half, the company announced Monday ...
Other
insurers are also expected to downsize their involvement or to hike rates in
coming weeks.
"Today, planning and pricing for
ACA-compliant health plans has become increasingly difficult due to a shrinking
and deteriorating individual market, as well as continual changes and
uncertainty in federal operations, rules and guidance, including cost sharing
reduction subsidies and the restoration of taxes on fully insured coverage," the
company said in a statement.
http://money.cnn.com/2017/08/07/news/economy/anthem-obamacare/index.html
August 7: Every county in the United States
is expected to have at least one health insurer offering coverage through the
Affordable Care Act's exchanges in 2018, with the announcement Thursday that
the nonprofit insurer CareSource next year has agreed to offer plans in the last
potential "bare" county in Ohio.
As many as 82 counties nationwide – many concentrated in states including
Missouri, Nevada, Ohio and Tennessee – had previously been considered at risk of
having no coverage offerings for 2018.
https://www.usnews.com/news/national-news/articles/2017-08-24/last-bare-county-in-us-to-have-obamacare-coverage-in-2018
August 7: In one bright spot for Obamacare,
Blue Cross and Blue Shield of North Carolina announced it is reducing its
requested 2018 premium increase to 14.1% because its policyholders filed
lower-than-expected medical claims in June and July. The company had initially
asked for a 22.9% rate hike, much of which is due to the uncertainty surrounding
the cost-sharing subsidies.
http://money.cnn.com/2017/08/07/news/economy/anthem-obamacare/index.html
August 24: Percentage of Americans aged
under 65 without health insurance (see comparison chart)
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-38663043
The Department of Health and Human Services announced Thursday that it is
cutting the advertising budget for the upcoming open enrollment period for
individual insurance policies by a stunning 90%, to $10 million from last year's
$100 million. The HHS also is cutting funds for nonprofit groups that employ
"navigators," those who help people in the individual market understand their
options and sign up, by roughly 40%, to $36.8 million from $62.5 million.
http://beta.latimes.com/business/hiltzik/la-fi-hiltzik-trump-obamacare-20170901-story.html
September 6: After a dramatic series of
failed Senate votes in July, there’s one repeal-and-replace plan for the
Affordable Care Act left standing. ... The proposal, crafted by Sens. Bill
Cassidy (R-La.), Lindsey O. Graham (R-S.C.) and Dean Heller (R-Nev.),
essentially turns control of the health-care markets over to the states. ... It
also allows states to opt out of many ACA regulations.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/2017/politics/cassidy-graham-explainer/?utm_term=.e3b7013fc012
September 18:
The 4 steps for Republicans to
repeal Obamacare in the next 2 weeks
https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2017/9/18/16327468/senate-republicans-obamacare-repeal-cassidy-graham-4-steps
September 21: Republicans are caught between
a rock and a hard place ...
The rock is the seven years of near-constant campaign promises that the first
thing they would do if given full power in Washington is repeal and replace
Obamacare. Republicans won control of the House in 2010 -- and gained seats in
2014 -- almost entirely on that message.
The hard place is the fact that the legislation sponsored by Sens. Lindsey
Graham of South Carolina and Bill Cassidy of Louisiana is being moved rapidly
through the legislative process because of a drop-dead deadline of the end of
the month. That means that it isn't going through anything close to regular
order -- up to and including the fact that the Congressional Budget Office won't
score the bill -- for costs etc. -- before the Senate needs to vote.
To not make good on the
promise -- with total control of Washington and no one to blame -- would be, in
the minds of many Republican elected officials, a complete betrayal of their
base, with potentially disastrous consequences on the ballot next fall.
http://www.cnn.com/2017/09/21/politics/grassley-trump-health-care/?iid=ob_article_footer_expansion
September 22:
Right and Left React to the
Graham-Cassidy Bill
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/09/22/us/politics/graham-cassidy-bill-right-and-left.html?mcubz=1
September 22: Senator John McCain (R-AZ)
announced his opposition to the Graham-Cassidy legislation on Friday,
likely killing the health-care bill’s chances of passing the Senate. “I
cannot in good conscience vote for the Graham-Cassidy proposal,” McCain said in
a statement. “I believe we could do better working together, Republicans and
Democrats, and have not yet really tried. Nor could I support it without knowing
how much it will cost, how it will effect [sic] insurance premiums, and
how many people will be helped or hurt by it.
https://www.thedailybeast.com/mccain-i-cannot-in-good-conscience-vote-for-graham-cassidy
September 22: Sen. Rand Paul of Kentucky
said he would not back Graham-Cassidy
http://www.cnn.com/2017/09/22/politics/john-mccain-health-care/index.html
September 22: The push for single-payer
healthcare just went national.
http://www.latimes.com/politics/la-pol-ca-bernie-sanders-single-payer-20170922-htmlstory.html
September 24: Sen. Susan Collins said Sunday
morning that it would be "very difficult for me to envision a scenario" where
she would vote for Republicans' latest plan to repeal and replace Obamacare, but
the Maine Republican said she wanted to wait for a Congressional Budget Office
score of the Graham-Cassidy bill before rendering a final decision.
http://www.cnn.com/2017/09/24/politics/susan-collins-graham-cassidy-decision/index.html
Undated: Click link for Physicians
for a National Health Program chart comparing health plans:
http://www.pnhp.org/sites/default/files/HR676vsACAvsAHCA.pdf
Undated: The United States is the only
country in the developed world that does not guarantee access to basic health
care for residents. Countries that guarantee health care as a human right do so
through a “single-payer” system, which replaces the thousands of for-profit
health insurance companies with a public, universal plan.
Does that sound impossible to win in the United States? It already exists – for
seniors! Medicare is a public, universal plan that provides basic health
coverage to those age 65 and older. Medicare costs less than private health
insurance, provides better financial security, and is preferred by patients (Davis,
2012). Single-payer health care is often referred to as “Expanded & Improved
Medicare for All.”
https://www.healthcare-now.org/what-is-single-payer/
September 24:
A Canadian Doctor Explains How Her
Country's Single-Payer Health Care System Works
http://www.npr.org/2017/09/24/553336111/a-canadian-doctor-explains-how-her-countrys-single-payer-health-care-system-work
September 20:
Single-payer health care: What is it?
http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2017/09/20/single-payer-health-care-what-is-it.html
September 25:
Whose Health Care Is Best? A Look at the Pros and Cons of 6 Countries’ Health
Care Systems Across the World
https://www.brit.co/whose-healthcare-is-best-a-look-at-the-pros-and-cons-of-6-countries-healthcare-systems-across-the-world/
Undated:
What are the pros and cons of a
single payer system vs. universal healthcare?
https://www.quora.com/What-are-the-pros-and-cons-of-a-single-payer-system-vs-universal-healthcare
Undated: Proponents of the right to health
care say that no one in the richest nation on earth should go without health
care. They argue that a right to health care would stop medical bankruptcies,
improve public health, reduce overall health care spending, help small
businesses, and that health care should be an essential government service.
Opponents argue that a right to
health care amounts to socialism and that it should be an individual's
responsibility, not the government's role, to secure health care. They say that
government provision of health care would decrease the quality and availability
of health care, and would lead to larger government debt and deficits.
https://healthcare.procon.org/
List of Pros and Cons of Single
Payer Health Care [also at January 25, 2015]
https://occupytheory.org/list-of-pros-and-cons-of-single-payer-health-care/
https://www.medpagetoday.com/washington-watch/reform/55879
September 1: Slashing advertising and
outreach funds, Trump takes his sabotage of Obamacare to a new level
http://beta.latimes.com/business/hiltzik/la-fi-hiltzik-trump-obamacare-20170901-story.html
September 18: As Federal Government Cuts
Obamacare Ads, Private Insurer Steps Up
Open enrollment for Affordable Care Act insurance doesn't start for another six
weeks. But the quirky insurance startup Oscar
Health is launching an ad campaign Monday aimed at getting young people to
enroll.
The company is boosting its ad spending after the Trump administration announced
it would
slash its ACA advertising budget by 90 percent.
Oscar is the first private insurance company to step in to try to make up for
government's advertising cuts. Whether others join them — and whether they're
effective — will only be clear when open enrollment ends, and the numbers are
tallied sometime early next year.
https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2017/09/18/551776441/as-federal-government-cuts-obamacare-ads-private-insurer-steps-up
September 22: Obamacare signup site to be shut down for 12 hours nearly every Sunday of open
enrollment
HHS regularly schedules maintenance outages for Healthcare.gov during open
enrollment period, according to a spokesperson from the Centers for Medicare &
Medicaid Service. The spokesperson said the schedule was provided earlier this
year “to accommodate requests from certified application assisters.”
“System downtime is planned for the lowest-traffic time periods on
HealthCare.gov including Sunday evenings and overnight,” the spokesperson said
in a written statement to the NewsHour.
The department has already planned to shorten open enrollment season by 45 days
— running from
Nov. 1 to
Dec. 15, 2017 for 2018 coverage. During the previous enrollment period,
people had twice as much time to enroll for individual health insurance.
https://www.pbs.org/newshour/health/obamacare-signup-site-shut-12-hours-nearly-every-sunday-open-enrollment
October 12: President Donald Trump took his
first steps Thursday toward fulfilling his vow to dismantle Obamacare, signing
an executive order that he says will bring affordable health insurance to
millions more people.
The order [which] broadly tasks
the administration with developing policies to increase health care competition
and choice in order to improve the quality of health care and lower prices ...
could also destabilize Obamacare by siphoning out younger and healthier
Americans from the exchanges ... The changes could take six months or more to
take effect, a senior administration official said.
http://www.cnn.com/2017/10/12/politics/trump-obamacare-executive-order/index.html
October 12: Critics ... worry that [Trump's]
order may free these association health plans from several key Obamacare
regulations and from state oversight, allowing them to sell plans with lower
premiums but skimpier benefits across state lines. That could siphon off younger
and healthier customers from Obamacare and send premiums skyrocketing for sicker
people left in the exchanges.
http://fox8.com/2017/10/12/ill-do-it-myself-trump-hopes-to-boost-lower-premium-health-insurance-plans/
October 12:
Insurers have already signed contracts committing them to participating in 2018
and setting their rates. They must continuing [sic] offering the reduced deductibles
and co-pays to eligible enrollees, but they won't be paid for them. That's why
many asked for such large rate hikes.
http://www.thedenverchannel.com/news/national/trump-will-end-health-care-subsidies-for-some-low-income-americans
October 12: A statement from 18 patient
groups, follows:
“This order has the potential to price millions of people with pre-existing
conditions and serious illnesses out of the individual insurance market and put
millions more at risk through the sale of insurance plans that won’t cover all
the services patients want to stay healthy or the critical care they need when
they get sick.
“Allowing the expansion of association health plans and exempting them from
covering the essential health benefits—including services like preventive care,
prescription drugs, or hospitalization—would mean Americans could again face
arbitrary annual or lifetime coverage caps and insufficient benefits. Short-term
plans would no longer be short-term, but instead could be sold for a year and
renewed indefinitely. These plans can deny coverage based on pre-existing
conditions and are inadequate for long-term insurance needs ..."
http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20171012006307/en/Health-Insurance-Put-Meaningful-Health-Coverage-Reach
October 12: The action ... is likely to spur
many lawsuits. New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman, who is part of a
coalition defending the subsidies, swiftly announced that group would take
action against Trump.
Nearly 6 million enrollees, or 57%, qualify for the cost-sharing payments this
year, according to the most recent data from the Department of Health and Human
Services.
The uncertainty over the subsidies' fate was a key reason that many insurers are
substantially hiking their rates for 2018 -- some by more than 20%. Several
major carriers dropped out of the individual market, unwilling to wait and see
what Trump and congressional Republicans would do.
http://www.cnn.com/2017/10/12/politics/obamacare-subsidies/index.html
On Twitter: The Democrats ObamaCare is
imploding. Massive subsidy payments to their pet insurance companies has
stopped. Dems should call me to fix!
October 13
@realDonaldTrump
October 13: "So what happens now? Lawsuits,
lawsuits, and more lawsuits," Nicholas Bagley, an assistant professor of law at
the University of Michigan, wrote in a blog post Thursday night.
Insurers and state officials could sue the Trump administration
for ending the payments. New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman, who is
part of a coalition defending the subsidies, announced Friday that a group of
states filed a lawsuit to force the president to continue the funding.
http://money.cnn.com/2017/10/13/news/economy/trump-obamacare-subsidies/index.html
October 14:
The damage is not catastrophic. But it is real and it will linger.
That was the conclusion
many health care industry officials and analysts had reached by week’s end,
following a pair of blows that President
Donald Trump delivered to the
Affordable Care Act ― and, indirectly, to the millions of people who buy
private health insurance on their own.
The first blow came on
Thursday, in the form of an
executive order designed to undermine the new rules that “Obamacare” has
placed on insurers. The 2010 health care law famously prohibits carriers from
denying coverage to people with pre-existing conditions. It also requires that
all plans cover a set of “essential” health benefits including mental health and
maternity care.
With the executive order, Trump instructed three federal agencies to carve out
some exceptions to those rules. The result could be a parallel market full of
plans that don’t have all of the essential benefits and, in some cases, that are
available to people only in relatively good health.
https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/trumps-obamacare-sabotage-is-doing-real-damage-to-american-health-care_us_59e1840be4b04d1d5182082d
October 14: It's true large companies can't
exclude or charge higher premiums to individual workers based on their medical
history, as Paul and the Trump administration are quick to point out. But the
rates an employer pays as a whole are based on the health status of its workers.
... it's likely association plans would try to cherry pick small businesses with
younger and healthier staffers. They could do this by charging higher premiums
or offering skimpier benefits to firms with older and sicker workers, or those
with more women, who tend to use more health care services.
http://money.cnn.com/2017/10/14/news/economy/trumps-executive-order-pre-existing-conditions/index.html
October 23: The Trump administration's move
to slash Obamacare outreach and education budgets will lead to at least 1.1
million fewer people signing up for health insurance this enrollment season,
a new analysis estimates.
And those 1.1 million lost customers will tend to be younger and healthier than
the people who do sign up, putting even more financial pressure on health
insurers, the analysis found.
https://www.cnbc.com/2017/10/23/trumps-obamacare-ad-cuts-will-slash-enrollment-by-more-than-one-million.html
October 23: Collectively, "the impact is
pretty grim," [Joshua Peck, former chief marketing officer for
HealthCare.gov] said in an interview.
Peck also said he expects the administration to use the lower enrollment figures
and higher premium prices that result from its own actions as ammunition to bash
the law further.
"They're clearly going to say that the declining enrollment is evidence of lack
of popular support of Obamacare, and I think there's a lot of evidence that
shows that is patently false," Peck said.
https://www.cnbc.com/2017/10/23/trumps-obamacare-ad-cuts-will-slash-enrollment-by-more-than-one-million.html
November 3: Trump personally pushing GOP
leaders to use tax bill to undermine Obamacare ... Party leaders ... took a
preliminary step to study Trump’s proposal to include language in the tax bill
that would scrap the Affordable Care Act’s individual mandate, a change
nonpartisan analysts say would save the government more than $400 billion over a
decade but would also leave 15 million more Americans without health insurance.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/powerpost/obamacare-mandate-could-still-be-repealed-in-gop-tax-bill-chairman-says/2017/11/03/efdf4e38-c0c3-11e7-8444-a0d4f04b89eb_story.html?utm_term=.bab7c1c34aa5
November 6: President Donald Trump's 90
percent cut to Obamacare advertising has U.S. health insurers in many states
digging deeper into their pockets to get the word out about 2018 enrollment,
which opened last week.
Independence Blue Cross, a health insurer in Pennsylvania, has commissioned a
tractor trailer truck to bring insurance consultants out to shopping centers and
other neighborhood spots around Philadelphia.
Centene Corp
November 8:
Where the states stand on Medicaid expansion ... 32
states, D.C., have expanded Medicaid ...
https://www.advisory.com/daily-briefing/resources/primers/medicaidmap
November 8: Obamacare made a comeback in Tuesday’s elections, its strongest
show of support since President Donald Trump was elected and the GOP spent
months on a futile effort to repeal it.
In the governor’s race in Virginia and a ballot initiative in Maine, the
Affordable Care Act buoyed Democrats, a remarkable reversal from how Trump and
congressional Republicans won elections excoriating the “failed” and “doomed”
law.
https://www.politico.com/story/2017/11/08/obamacare-boost-at-the-polls-244696
November 9: More than
600,000 people selected Obamacare plans for 2018 from Nov. 1 to Nov. 4 in
the 39 states that use the HealthCare.gov eligibility and enrollment platform,
Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services said Thursday. Last year, about
415,500 enrolled from Nov. 1 to Nov. 5.
The early figures follow other evidence that voters are more supportive of
Obamacare than the president and Republicans in Congress who have attempted
to kill the law. In Maine, voters approved the expansion of the Medicaid program
for the poor, a vote that could encourage other states to follow. Among a string
of victories for Democrats in off-year elections, Virginia voters who elected a
Democratic governor cited health care as a
top issue in their decision.
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-11-09/more-than-600-000-sign-up-for-obamacare-in-first-four-days
December 11: The Senate
included a repeal of the Obamacare
tax on those who don't get health insurance in its tax
reform plan. The CBO
estimated 13 million people would drop coverage as a result. The federal
government would no longer have to pay the health
insurance subsidies of the people who would drop coverage. That would save
it $338 billion. On the other hand, health
care costs will rise because fewer people will get preventive
care.
https://www.thebalance.com/how-could-trump-change-health-care-in-america-4111422
December 19: Congressional Republicans are
cheering
a major win as tax reform makes its way through Congress to President Donald
Trump's desk but they could be barreling toward a government shutdown at the
end of the week because of a major fight between House and Senate GOP lawmakers
over Obamacare payments.
Unless they pass a stopgap funding bill before a midnight Friday deadline,
federal agencies' coffers run dry.
http://www.cnn.com/2017/12/19/politics/government-shutdown-republicans-congress/index.html
December 15: Will Obamacare survive the tax
bill?
http://money.cnn.com/2017/12/15/news/economy/obamacare-individual-mandate-tax/index.html
December 18: Without the Insurance Mandate,
Health Care’s Future May Be in Doubt
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/12/18/us/politics/tax-cut-obamacare-individual-mandate-repeal.html
December 19:
Republicans will regret this tax bill sooner rather than later.
https://newrepublic.com/minutes/146363/republicans-will-regret-tax-bill-sooner-rather-later
December 20: The House on Wednesday approved
a massive Republican plan to overhaul the tax code, clearing the bill’s final
hurdle in Congress and sending it to President Trump to be signed into law.
The measure passed the House 224 to 201 as overwhelming Republican support
carried the bill past unanimous Democratic opposition and ‘no’ votes from 12 GOP
members. The House vote comes after the Senate approved an identical measure
early Wednesday morning, with all Democrats opposed and all Republicans present
in support.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/economy/gop-tax-bill-passes-congress-as-trump-prepares-to-sign-it-into-law/2017/12/20/0ba2fd98-e597-11e7-9ec2-518810e7d44d_story.html?utm_term=.05cc4dca2e03
December 20: Obamacare
will survive -- It won’t be pretty. But the law might really, finally be in the
clear.
The Affordable Care Act is going to survive. Republicans are on
track to repeal the law's individual mandate in their tax overhaul
as early as next week. ... Repealing the individual mandate is a legitimate blow
to the Obamacare marketplaces, but doing so won't unravel the markets
entirely.
https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2017/12/18/16777418/obamacare-will-survive
December 21: Nearly 9 Million Signed Up for
Obamacare Despite Trump's War Against It ...
Obamacare enrollment through federal websites reached 8.8 million this year,
the Trump administration said on Thursday, just shy of the number who signed up
in 2016 when the enrollment period was twice as long. [The number excludes the
millions more who enrolled in Obamacare through state-run marketplaces, like
those in New York, California, and about a dozen other states.] ... Although the
individual mandate was repealed in the tax bill, it’s still in effect for 2018.
http://fortune.com/2017/12/21/obamacare-enrollment-surge-despite-trump/
-- 2018 --
February 1: GOP eyes premium help at
retreat, but ObamaCare 'full repeal' tabled
http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2018/02/01/gop-eyes-premium-help-at-retreat-but-obamacare-full-repeal-tabled.html
March 17: You were told the
Republican tax bill would cut your taxes. ... But in the end, you may not
have any more money in your pocket.
That's because higher health care premiums will cancel out the tax cut for those
buying insurance on the Affordable Care Act exchanges without government
subsidies. As many as 150,000 New Jerseyans could be affected.
The rate hikes will occur because the measure signed by President Donald
Trump repeals the requirement that all Americans carry health
insurance or pay a penalty.
"For middle-class people buying their own insurance, it could very well be that
the premium increases will wipe out any savings they're getting from the tax
cuts," said Larry Levitt, senior vice president with the Kaiser Family
Foundation, which studies health care.
Besides ending the individual mandate, the Trump administration cut last year's
enrollment period in half, reduced efforts to help people sign up for insurance,
ended payments
to insurance companies to cover deductibles and co-payments for low-income
policyholders, and took other steps to
weaken the law.
"The administration's sabotage, coupled with the Republican tax scam that
repealed the individual mandate, will result in massive health care cost
increases."
http://www.nj.com/politics/index.ssf/2018/03/trump_tax_plan_will_take_from_nj_as_much_as_it_giv.html
June 5: ... it looks like Obamacare premiums
could jump by double digits again next year.
Insurers in several states have requested large rate hikes for 2019, with many
pointing to steps taken by President Donald Trump and Republicans in Congress as
the main reasons why.
New York insurers want to hike rates by 24%, on average, while carriers in
Washington are looking for a 19% average premium increase. In Maryland,
CareFirst is asking for an average 18.5% rate bump for its HMO plans and a 91%
spike for its PPO policies (which have far fewer enrollees), while Kaiser
Permanente wants to boost premiums by more than 37%, on average.
Many insurers cite two key drivers of the increases: Congress' elimination of
the penalty for the individual mandate -- which requires nearly all Americans to
have coverage or pay up -- and the Trump administration's
expected expansion of two types of health plans that don't have to adhere to
Obamacare's regulations.
https://www.cnn.com/2018/06/07/politics/obamacare-premiums/index.html
July 3: Badly Injured Woman Begs Passersby Not To Call An Ambulance,
Due To Cost
Welcome to America: Where the pain of crippling debt from medical bills exceeds
the visceral, searing pain of a literally crippling injury.
This stark epiphany brought to you by Maria Cramer, a reporter at the Boston
Globe. Last Friday, Cramer encountered a woman during her commute whose leg
slipped into the gap between the train and the platform, where it was pinned,
twisted and bloodied.
Despite being in agony, the 45-year-old woman, whose name hasn’t been released,
begged bystanders who came to her aid not to call an ambulance ― because she
couldn’t afford it:
https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/injured-woman-no-ambulance-too-expensive_us_5b3bda49e4b09e4a8b283583
July 30: When a lawsuit challenging the
Affordable Care Act reached his Washington, DC, appeals court in 2011, Judge
Brett Kavanaugh was careful not to commit. He described the law requiring people
to buy health insurance as "unprecedented" and the breadth of Obama
administration's defense of it "jarring."
"[T]here seems no good reason," wrote Kavanaugh, now President Donald Trump's
choice for the US Supreme Court, "that [the administration's] theory would not
ultimately extend as well to mandatory purchases of retirement accounts, housing
accounts, college savings accounts, disaster insurance, disability insurance,
and life insurance, for example."
https://www.cnn.com/2018/07/30/politics/brett-kavanaugh-obamacare-joe-manchin/index.html
August 2:
How Much Did Obamacare Cost?
Learn Why the Affordable Care Act Doesn't Add to
the Debt
Does Obamacare add
to the
U.S. debt, or reduce it? The answers can be very confusing. Estimates range
from saving $143 billion over the next decade to adding $1.76 trillion to it.
And then there's
President Obama's initial claim that the
Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act would add $940 billion to the
debt. Who's right? They all are. Here's how.
https://www.thebalance.com/cost-of-obamacare-3306050
November 1:
Trump Administration Hands States Another Tool for Dismantling Preexisting
Condition Protections
Last week, the Trump administration issued long-anticipated guidance regarding
the Affordable Care Act’s Section 1332 “innovation waiver” program. The release
rebrands and creatively reimagines the ACA program (they’re now “State Relief
and Empowerment” waivers), breaking dramatically with past policy and, arguably,
with the statute it purports to interpret. In the administration’s view, the ACA
permits states to funnel federal dollars towards insurance products, such as
short-term plans, which do not meet the ACA’s key consumer protections, while
reducing support for consumers who depend on coverage compliant with the ACA’s
rules. Further, the new guidance assures states that they may push forward with
such policies even if they will have a detrimental effect on people with
preexisting conditions, those at lower incomes, or older Americans.
https://ccf.georgetown.edu/2018/11/01/trump-administration-hands-states-another-tool-for-dismantling-preexisting-condition-protections/
November 28:
Obamacare Sign-Ups Lag As Trump Slashes Funds For Enrollment Help
Enrollment is down sharply on the federal health insurance marketplace this
fall, and the consumer assistance groups that help with sign-ups think they know
why.
They don't have the staff to help as many customers as before because the Trump
administration slashed funding. The federal government is spending
$10 million this year on navigators who help individuals enroll in coverage.
The government spent $36 million in 2017 and $63 million in 2016.
https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2018/11/28/671045006/obamacare-sign-ups-lag-as-trump-slashes-funds-for-enrollment-help
November 29: Trump
Administration proposes using ACA subsidies to buy non-Obamacare health
insurance
Democrats demand answers to what they call a sabotage of the ACA.
https://www.healthcarefinancenews.com/news/trump-administration-proposes-using-aca-subsidies-buy-non-obamacare-health-insurance
December 14:
Former President Barack Obama released
a video
earlier this week urging people to hurry up and shop for health insurance on the
Affordable Care Act exchange.
"This year I'm giving it to you straight," Obama says in the video. "It's
important to have health insurance in case, God forbid, you get really sick, or
hurt yourself next year."
"I hate to panic but I do think we're going to come in low on the federal
exchange, says
Rosemarie Day, CEO of Day Health Strategies. Day was the founding COO of
Massachusetts' state
exchange, which launched in 2006, long before the Affordable Care Act became
law.
She blames the lower enrollment on the Trump Administration's decision to slash
the advertising budget for open enrollment. Outreach, she says, is crucial to
making sure that people who need insurance know where and when to get it.
https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2018/12/14/676526601/aca-sign-ups-have-lagged-for-2019-but-what-does-that-mean
December 15:
A federal judge in Texas said on Friday that the Affordable Care Act's
individual coverage mandate is unconstitutional and that the rest of the law
therefore cannot stand.
The ruling and expected appeal sets up another cliffhanger in which the fate of
the law, which Republicans have unsuccessfully tried to repeal for years, will
likely once again ultimately lie with the Supreme Court.
https://www.cnn.com/2018/12/14/politics/texas-aca-lawsuit/index.html
December 15:
Obamacare Will ‘Likely’ Survive Judge’s Ruling, Obama Tweets
He reassures Americans as he reminds people to sign up for the health care
program before the deadline.
https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/obamacare-will-likely-survive-judges-ruling-says-obama_us_5c158727e4b049efa752d780
December 16:
Chuck Schumer Urges Congressional Vote Rejecting Obamacare Ruling
“If a majority of the House and a majority of the Senate say that this case
should be overturned, it’ll have a tremendous effect on the appeal,” Schumer
said.
https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/obamacare-decision-chuck-schumer_us_5c16602de4b05d7e5d82f100
December 18: Despite Court Ruling To
Eliminate Obamacare, States Plan To Expand Healthcare For The Poor
Voters in Idaho, Nebraska and Utah recently approved plans to extend health
insurance to 331,000.
https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/medicaid-aca-healthcare-court_us_5c192b4de4b01954d9b0690a
-- 2019 --
January 18: The
Trump Administration Signals That It’s Not Done Trying To Dismantle Obamacare
A discussion document floated this week reveals the Trump White House is
considering a slew of reforms to the individual markets that could potentially
throw them into chaos.
https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/paulmcleod/trump-administration-obamacare-rule
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