Copyright truthout
On Wednesday, President Donald Trump made an unusual plea for a bipartisan replacement of the Affordable Care Act (ACA), as the program announced drastic increases in premiums this month. “We have to fix health care, because Obamacare is a disaster,” Trump told reporters aboard Air Force One during a flight this week to South Korea. Trump has frequently attempted to repeal the health care law implemented by former President Barack Obama — indeed, one of the most embarrassing moments in the first half of Trump’s first term included his failure to pass a repeal of the ACA. That attempt seven years ago was a partisan package offered by Republicans (which faced bipartisan opposition). Trump’s comments this week indicate that he now wants the GOP to work with Democrats to repeal the law. “When you see the increases in Obamacare, it never worked,” Trump claimed, referring to rising prices of health plans. “It never will work, and we can do something with the Democrats much better than Obamacare.” He called for a plan that would cost “less money” and provide “better health care.” “I think that’s something that could come out of this with the Democrats. We work with the Democrats,” Trump reiterated. It’s unclear whether Trump, who has antagonized Democrats throughout the government shutdown, would be willing to reach across the aisle. The president has disparaged his political opponents multiple times in the past several weeks, including by sharing racist, AI-generated videos featuring House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-New York). He also shared a meme from a follower on his Truth Social website describing Democrats as the party of “hate, evil and Satan.” Trump indicated to reporters that any health plan he’d want to see passed would still help insurance companies “make money,” adding that “they’re entitled to that.” Many of the “failures” of the ACA that Trump is referring to are of his administration’s own making, something he neglected to mention in his calls for overturning the 15-year-old health care law. This week, ACA marketplaces announced huge increases in monthly premium payments. For a typical plan in the 30 states where the marketplaces are managed by the federal government, consumers can expect, on average, a 30 percent uptick in costs. In the states that manage their own marketplaces, prices are set to increase by about 17 percent, on average. Insurers have the ability to raise premiums by that much due to a rule change that was quietly implemented by the Trump administration earlier this year. The biggest increases to health plans, however, are set to come at the end of this year, when tax credits given to ACA recipients to help pay for plans are set to expire. Democrats are refusing to vote in favor of a continuing resolution to fund the government, with hopes that they can compel Republicans to restore those credits, as well as other funds for federal health care programs. If the credits are not restored, around 22 million Americans could see their premiums more than double next year, on top of the price increases that were announced this week. Collectively, those individuals could see their costs go up by $23 billion next year alone due to the tax credit expiration. In a report from Sen. Bernie Sanders’s office earlier this month anticipating higher costs, the independent Vermont lawmaker also noted that around 85 million people in the U.S. are uninsured or underinsured, adding that the country pays “twice as much for health care per person than virtually every major country in the world.” Sanders offered a solution in his report — Medicare for All — that Trump has blasted in the past, despite the proposal being less expensive than the current health system in the U.S. and likely to be more effective in saving lives. Wrote Sanders in his report: In my view, we have to do what every other major country on earth has done, and guarantee health care as a human right through a Medicare for All, single-payer system. But in the midst of all of this, Trump and his Republican colleagues are doing exactly the opposite. They are making a horrific situation even worse by pushing our health care system to the verge of collapse. Several establishment Democrats believe that Medicare for All would be a losing issue for the party. However, multiple polls demonstrate that the opposite is true, and that it could even win over more voters in future elections. An Economist/YouGov poll in July, for example, found that nearly 6 in 10 Americans (59 percent) back a Medicare for All proposal. Only 27 percent said they would oppose the idea. That survey wasn’t a one-off, either. In December 2024, a Gallup poll similarly found that 62 percent of Americans would back Medicare for All, with only 36 percent opposed.
