President Johnson disputes the allegation that he will try to repeal ObamaCare

Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) is challenging Democrats’ claim that he wants to repeal ObamaCare after Vice President Harris’ campaign seized on comments he made this week at a campaign stop.

“Despite the Harris campaign’s disingenuous characterizations, the audio and transcript make it clear that I made no such promise to end ObamaCare and, in fact, acknowledged that the policy is ‘deeply entrenched’ in our health care system,” said Johnson in a statement. towards the Hill.

“However, House Republicans will always seek to lower costs and improve the quality and availability of health care for all Americans. Anyone who has been a patient or known a loved one who has struggled with health issues understands why this is so important,” said Johnson.

ObamaCare, also known as the Affordable Care Act (ACA), came up Monday as Johnson took questions at a campaign stop in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, and was asked about former President Trump’s plans for health care reform.

“Healthcare reform will be on the agenda,” Johnson said. “When I say we have a very aggressive agenda for the first 100 days, we have a lot on the table.”

“Trump is going to be big,” Johnson later said. “He will only have one more term and so he will be thinking about the legacy.”

“No ObamaCare?” asked a person in the crowd.

Johnson repeated, “No ObamaCare,” as he rolled his eyes and bowed his head, continuing, “ACA is so deeply entrenched. We need massive reforms to make this work, and we have lots of ideas about how to do that.”

The Harris campaign blasted Johnson’s comments in a statement Tuesday, arguing they showed a Republican plan to get rid of ObamaCare.

“Health care is on the ballot in November. Speaker Mike Johnson makes it clear — if Donald Trump wins, he and his Project 2025 allies in Congress will make sure ‘there is no Obamacare,’” Harris campaign spokeswoman Sarafina Chitika said in a statement, citing a NBC News article which first reported the comments and video of the exchange.

In response to Johnson’s rebuttal on Wednesday, Chitika stood his ground: “Mike Johnson probably didn’t want to give the American people a presentation of his and Donald Trump’s plans in Project 2025 to rip up health care coverage, increase the costs for millions of people. Americans and remove protections for pre-existing conditions. But voters heard it from his own mouth: If Trump wins, there will be no “Obamacare,” plain and simple. We couldn’t have said it better ourselves.”

But while Johnson says he hasn’t committed to repealing the ACA, he has talked about changes to the health care system.

At the campaign event, Johnson referenced a “menu” of health care reforms proposed by the GOP Doctors Caucus, made up of members of Congress who are physicians.

“You take the government bureaucrats out of the health care equation and you have doctor-patient relationships, it’s better for everyone — more efficient, more effective. This is the free market. Trump will be for the free market. You heard a little sample of that last night,” Johnson said, “We want to take a torch to the regulatory state.”

Still, the back-and-forth highlights the difficulty Republicans have had in articulating plans for the now-popular health care law they tried unsuccessfully to repeal during Trump’s tenure in the White House.

ObamaCare was one of the most important achievements for Democrats, but it wasn’t always so popular.

Almost as soon as the law was passed in 2010, it became a political albatross for Democrats. It cost them control of the House and Senate and ultimately the presidency, as Trump won the White House in 2016 on a pledge to “repeal and replace” the health care law.

But after Trump and congressional Republicans failed to repeal the law in 2017 by a single vote, its popularity soared. Democrats regained control of the House in 2018, campaigning to protect pre-existing conditions. The White House released a report last month showing that nearly 50 million people gained coverage under the law over the past decade.

Harris promised to build on the law and strengthen it if elected.

When pressed by ABC moderators during the presidential debate in September, Trump admitted that he currently has no plan to replace ObamaCare if it were to be repealed, only “concepts of a plan.”

Trump has criticized the law lately, also claiming he “saved” it from failure.

The Republican presidential nominee was never specific about how he would replace health coverage for tens of millions of Americans.

Updated at 4:20 p.m

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