Mike Lee Thinks the Healthcare Bill Is a Joke

Late Friday night, Utah senator Mike Lee issued a lengthy statement (which is well worth reading in full) ripping and ridiculing the Senate GOP health care bill:

No, the Senate healthcare bill released yesterday does not repeal Obamacare. It doesn’t even significantly reform American healthcare. It cuts taxes. It bails out insurance companies. It props up Obamacare through the next election. It lays out plans to slow Medicaid spending beginning in 2025, but that probably won’t happen. And it leaves in place the ham-fisted federal regulations that have driven up family health insurance premiums by 140 percent since Obamacare was implemented. As the bill is currently drafted, I won’t vote for it. . . . Far short of “repeal,” the Senate bill keeps the Democrats’ broken system intact, just with less spending on the poor to pay for corporate bailouts and tax cuts. A cynic might say that the BCRA is less a Republican health care bill than a caricature of a Republican health care bill. Yet, for all that, I have not closed the door on voting for some version of it in the end.

Later in the statement, Lee explains the one condition under which he’d vote for the bill:

I would still be willing to vote for it if it allowed states and/or individuals to opt-out of the Obamacare system free-and-clear to experiment with different forms of insurance, benefits packages, and care provision options. Liberal states might try single-payer systems, while conservatives might emphasize health savings accounts. Some people embrace association health plans or so-called “medishare” ministry models. My guess is different approaches will work for different people in different places—like everything else in life.

Although the Senate bill includes a waiver process for states to opt out of most of Obamacare’s regulations, it does not allow states to deviate from Obamacare’s rules forbidding insurers from treating any customers differently on the basis of pre-existing conditions. The House GOP bill, by contrast, would require insurers to offer coverage to everyone, but states could allow insurers to set a higher price for one year for anyone who experienced at least a two-month gap in insurance coverage.

Allowing states to opt out of any and all Obamacare regulations, including ones regarding pre-existing conditions, could lead some GOP Senate moderates to oppose the bill. On Friday, moderate senator Dean Heller of Nevada announced his own opposition, arguing that the bill cuts too much from Medicaid. The Senate bill can only lose two Republicans and still pass.

But it’s not entirely clear what Lee is pushing for: An aide to the senator tells me the details of Lee’s amendment to the bill are still coming together.

Mike Lee Thinks the Healthcare Bill Is a Joke

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