House Speaker Nancy Pelosi vowed Monday that Democrats would "fight relentlessly" to stop President Donald Trump from repealing Obamacare.
"The American people already know exactly what the president’s health care plans mean in their lives: higher costs, worse coverage and the end of lifesaving protections for people with pre-existing conditions," Pelosi said in a statement posted on her official website as Speaker of the House.
She added, "President Trump has waged an assault on health care since the start and continues to order the Justice Department to ask the courts to destroy protections for people with pre-existing conditions and strike down every other protection and guarantee of affordable health care for America’s families. And since Day One, the Trump administration has worked relentlessly to push families into disastrous junk plans, increase their health care costs and gut their health care protections."
In addition, Pelosi argued that "these urgent threats are why more than 140 House Democrats led a Health Care for All Americans Weekend of Action with district events and online town halls across the nation to raise a drumbeat for real steps to lower health costs and prescription drug prices. Democrats are 'For The People' and will continue to fight relentlessly to protect and strengthen hard-working families’ affordable health care."
During his interview with ABC News' George Stephanopoulos on Sunday, Trump said that the big unfinished piece of his agenda was repealing Obamacare.
"So we almost had health care done. Health care's a disaster — Obamacare. But we've managed it much better than they managed it," Trump told Stephanopoulos. "So we've made it serviceable, but it's not great. We almost had it done. We were one vote off, as you know. You know that whole story, and that was a very — unfortunate situation. We would have had great health care, so we're going to do that if we win the House. If we win back the House, we're going to produce phenomenal health care. And we already have the concept of the plan, but it'll be less expensive than Obamacare by a lot. And it'll be much better health care . . ."
When asked to elaborate on what his plan would include, Trump simply said that "we'll be announcing that in about two months — maybe less. So, yeah, sure you do. But — but, again, that's — that's subject to winning back the House, Senate and the presidency. You need the three."
When Stephanopoulos quoted former Vice President Joe Biden, who is now one of Trump's rivals for the 2020 election, as saying that repealing Obamacare would hurt Americans with preexisting health conditions, the president refuted that claim.
"Well, no. Preexisting conditions — I was for preexisting conditions. And I still — you know, I'm very much for preexisting conditions," Trump said. "But Obamacare has been a disaster."
When the ABC News anchor asked whether that group would be charged more under Trump's plan, the president insisted that "under my plan, they'll be much lower. You'll see that in a month when we — when we — introduce it. We're going to have a plan. That's subject to winning the House, Senate and presidency, which hopefully we'll win all three. We'll have phenomenal health care."
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