Health and Human Services Secretary Tom Price said Thursday that he did not know why President Trump had referred to the House healthcare bill as “mean.”
“I only know what I read in the papers,” Price said, speaking before the Senate Appropriations Committee.
In a meeting with 13 Republican senators working on a bill to repeal and replace portions of Obamacare, Trump reportedly said the House-passed bill wasn’t generous enough. Though senators declined to provide additional details about the meeting, they said it had been a positive interaction. On Twitter, Trump has proposed adding more funding to a healthcare bill, but hasn’t elaborated on whether it would be through reinsurance, tax credits or another means.
Price, a former GOP congressman from Georgia and a medical doctor, noted that he was not present at the meeting and did not discuss it with Trump. Democrats have blasted Republicans for working on a healthcare bill behind closed doors and for injecting uncertainty into the health insurance marketplace.
Price was responding to a line of questions about the Trump meeting from Sen. Jeff Merkley, D-Ore. He asked Price if Trump had called the bill “mean” because it threatened to reduce the number of uninsured and would provide a tax cut for the rich.
“I would disagree with that characterization,” Price replied.
A Congressional Budget Office report about the House-passed bill, the American Health Care Act, projected that if it were to pass, then 23 million more people would be uninsured by 2026. Various lawmakers have questioned whether the CBO estimate is accurate, and another report from the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services office of the actuaries pegged that number at 13 million. The House passed the bill without seeing the latest score from CBO.
