President Trump continued his blasting Friday of late Sen. John McCain voting against Republicans’ 2017 “skinny repeal” of a key provision of the Affordable Care Act (ACA), commonly called Obamacare.
“We got the individual mandate, the absolute worst part of Obamacare eliminated. Now we’re going for the rest and we had it [repealed] except for one vote. You know what I’m talking about,” Mr. Trump said during a speech for the National Rifle Association.
While technically still a provision of the ACA, Congress zeroed out the tax penalty that was assessed on individuals who failed to purchase health insurance, effectively disabling the individual mandate.
Mr. Trump also referenced it in an interview with Fox News Network’s “Hannity” Thursday evening, calling it “a tremendous disservice” to the country.
“He went thumbs-down at the very last moment and I thought it was a disgraceful thing to do and very, very bad for our country and bad for health care. It was done and then John McCain, at the very last moment, late in the evening, went thumbs-down and everybody said, ’What was that?’” he said.
Mr. Trump has carried his grudge against Mr. McCain months after the Arizona senator’s passing, saying he was “never a fan of John McCain” and he “never will be.”
• Bailey Vogt can be reached at bvogt@washingtontimes.com.
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