House Republicans launched an uphill bid Wednesday to redo national health care reform amid withering criticism from the White House and Democrats, who said the GOP’s long-awaited plan lacks details and that Obamacare already insures millions of people.
The plan, unveiled by Speaker Paul D. Ryan, would erase the 2010 Affordable Care Act’s insurance mandates and government-run exchanges in favor of incentives for joining private market plans.
It also embraces longtime Republican ideals, such as allowing insurance companies to sell policies across state lines, and calls for high-risk pools to provide coverage for sick Americans who are priced out of the private market.
“For six years now — six years — we have promised to repeal and replace Obamacare and make health care actually affordable,” Mr. Ryan said at the American Enterprise Institute. “Well, here it is: a real plan, in black and white, right here.”
The health care plan proposes an age-adjusted tax credit to help offset the costs of buying insurance for those who don’t receive coverage through their employers or government programs, in place of Obamacare’s income-based approach.
Mr. Ryan said the plan is staked on quality instead of quantity.
The Obama administration boasts that more than 20 million people have gained insurance under its overhaul, he said, yet the reforms have forced everyone to pay more or switch plans to stay within the law’s limits.
Democrats said Obamacare has established a large footprint over the past six years and Republicans should get used to it.
“As described, the Republican package would eliminate coverage for millions of Americans, devastate seniors and return us to a time when insurance companies could discriminate against people with pre-existing conditions,” said Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid, Nevada Democrat.
Democrats also pounced on the lack of detail in the Republican plan, including how many people it would cover and how much it would cost taxpayers.
Mr. Ryan “doesn’t get any credit for writing a white paper that doesn’t include many details. If he was actually serious about his job and actually serious about trying to improve the health care system in this country, then he would put forward a legislative proposal that would pass the House of Representatives. But he hasn’t done either one,” White House press secretary Josh Earnest said.
Obamacare premiums are projected to spike an average of 10 percent next year, according to a study of benchmark plans in more than a dozen cities, suggesting the health care law’s troubles will remain front and center in a hectic election year.
Analysts said insurers are still adjusting to a population that is sicker and smaller than expected and need to raise rates to cover the costs of participating in Obamacare’s web-based exchanges.
Presumptive Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump renewed his pledge to repeal Obamacare during a wide-ranging speech Wednesday aimed at Democratic rival Hillary Clinton, who has pledged to build on the law.
“It is a total disaster,” Mr. Trump said.
Among key provisions, the House Republicans’ plan would rein in federal spending on Medicaid — the government-run insurance program for the aged and the poor — by offering block grants or a per capita allotment of funding to the states.
States that had not expanded Medicaid under Obamacare as of Jan. 1 this year would be barred from doing so, and states that extended benefits to those making up to 138 percent of the federal poverty level would be given new powers to control costs under the Republican plan.
Timothy Jost, a law professor at Washington and Lee University in Virginia who tracks the health care debate, said many of the Republican proposals have been around for years.
The tax credits could help moderate-income people who don’t have job-based coverage, he said, but much of the proposal would hurt the poor and sick by reinstating risk-based underwriting, reining in Medicaid and scrapping Obamacare’s income-based subsidies.
“There is nothing here that was worth waiting six years for,” Mr. Jost said.
⦁ S.A. Miller contributed to this report.
• Tom Howell Jr. can be reached at thowell@washingtontimes.com.
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