Health and Human Services secretary Tom Price — a former congressman and a longtime critic of Obamacare — forcefully defended Republicans’ plans to repeal and replace Obamacare and facing sharp questions from Americans from both ends of the political spectrum with concerns about the GOP proposal.
“We believe strongly, strongly, that the plan we put together is so much better than the one that’s there now,” Price told the audience Wednesday night at a special CNN town hall event moderated by CNN’s Wolf Blitzer and Dana Bash.
Price is now responsible for selling the Republican Party’s controversial plan to overhaul the Affordable Care Act to his former colleagues in Congress and the public. He fielded emotionally charged questions ranging from funding for Planned Parenthood to whether the new plan would allow parents to choose whether they vaccinate their children and how to pay for addiction treatment.
At the forefront of the fast-moving health care debate in Washington is the House GOP bill to repeal Obamacare introduced last week, which continues to bleed support among Republicans in the lower chamber. GOP congressional leaders and the White House are furiously trying to assuage a range of concerns voiced by rank-and-file Republicans to ensure that they have the 216 votes needed for the bill to pass in the House.
One statement that Price had to stand by was his recent promise that nobody will be “financially worse off” under the Republican proposal. After an audience member named Teresa Caliari expressed concern that older Americans would see their premiums hiked under the GOP plan, Price was asked whether he could ensure that Caliari wouldn’t be hurt financially.
He demurred, saying simply: “I don’t believe you’ll be worse off from a health care standpoint.”
John Brogan, a former Marine, recovering addict and now an addiction recovery specialist, specifically asked Price how he would fix the opiate epidemic.
While Price assured Brogan that the epidemic was a “high priority,” Bash followed up to point out that the House repeal and replace plan would not require Medicaid to cover opiate addiction treatment.
Price argued that the treatment didn’t necessarily need to come through Medicaid and that his goal would be to give states more flexibility to fix the problem.
Also complicating matters for supporters of the House Republican plan is a new analysis from the Congressional Budget Office this week that predicts that the House GOP bill to repeal Obamacare would result in some 24 million more people being uninsured by 2026 than under the current system.
Price downplayed the CBO’s findings.
“They do a pretty good job with numbers — coverage is not their strong suit,” Price said. He also stressed that the CBO only took into account the House GOP bill while ignoring other steps Republicans plan to take through administrative and legislative actions.
“What the CBO looked at was just one third of the plan,” he said.
The CBO report also said the proposal would cut the federal deficit and average premiums would drop after a few years, but highlighted that some of the most vulnerable demographic groups including the elderly and low-income people would face steep premium hikes.
Price has been a key player in GOP leadership’s efforts to sell their House health care bill to skeptical members. A physician by training who authored an Obamacare repeal and replace bill when he was in the House, the HHS secretary has been making the rounds on Capitol Hill in recent weeks. Speaking with Republican lawmakers in both chambers, Price has sought to assuage widespread concerns about the changes to the health care system that GOP leaders are pursuing.
But that task has only grown more difficult in the aftermath of the CBO report. Moderate Republicans have grown even more wary of supporting a House bill that would lead to millions losing coverage — particularly as it appears to have no chance of getting through the Senate.
Another sticking point is what will happen to Medicaid. Thirty-one states opted to expand Medicaid under Obamacare, and many Republican governors and senators hailing from those states oppose changes that would weaken the program.
In an emotional question to start the town hall, a man who said Medicaid had saved his life and kept him from financial bankruptcy asked Price why he supported a plan that would sunset the Medicaid expansion in 2020 given that so many — like himself — had found care on it.
Price said it was wonderful the man had received the care he had, but “that’s not necessarily true for everybody.” Price argued that the program was “having extreme difficulty” providing care and that one out of every three physicians won’t see Medicaid patients.
Price also insisted that giving individual states more freedom would help “save money.”
“(Are you) going to treat healthy kids who need quality healthcare the same way you’re going to treat a disabled individual or an older individual?” Price asked.
Another emotional question for Price came from a woman named Katie Needle, who said she would be “devastated” if Planned Parenthood were defunded. Needle wanted to know how low-income women could continue receiving healthcare services if the organization they depend on is defunded through the Republican legislation.
Price responded that the bill has tried to address widespread concerns about federal tax dollars being used to perform abortion services. He also promised that the GOP legislation would “increase money for women’s health services.”