Vice President Mike Pence urged Congress to pass the Graham-Cassidy repeal bill during a Thursday interview on “Fox and Friends.
“Almost anything would be better than Obamacare. Obamacare’s imploding. It’s collapsing all across the country,” Pence said. “It’s remarkable to see the pattern. We’ve seen people losing their insurance. Losing their doctors. We’ve seen the average Americans see the cost of their insurance go up by more than $3,000.”
Pence said that Congress and the White House were on board with passing the GOP-sponsored legislation, adding that the new law would grant more flexibility to individual states and create better access to health care.
“We’re close. And the Graham-Cassidy bill we believe is the right solution and the right time. To repeal and replace Obamacare with the type of reform that will allow states to innovate and to create better quality health care, better access for Americans, and capture that innovation of democracy,” he said.
Pence contrasted the bill to Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders health care plan, warning that the ultimate goal of the Democratic Party is to force America to adopt a single-payer system. The vice president also reassured voters that coverage for preexisting conditions would be included in the final repeal bill.
“Graham-Cassidy as its authors have said, contains all the same protection for preexisting conditions as the president indicated, at the end of the day we have to recognize that Obamacare has failed,” Pence said.
When asked how he felt about Sen. Rand Paul opposing the bill, Pence said that he and President Donald Trump believe the senator is in the wrong.
“He’s [Paul] a good man but he’s wrong about this. Graham-Cassidy bill repeals and replaces Obamacare. It repeals the individual mandate. It repeals the business mandate. It repeals the tax penalties associated with that,” Pence said. “It repeals the medical device tax and other taxes but what it ultimately does is it block grants all of those resources back to the states, to do frankly even more than we were able to do when I was governor of Indiana.”
“This may well be our last, best chance to stop and turn around and head America back in the direction of the kind of health care reform that’s based on individual choice, state based innovation. And the president and I are determined to do all that we can to see this through,” he concluded.
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