A straight repeal of former President Obama’s 2010 healthcare law would put “vulnerable people at risk,” Health and Human Services Secretary Tom Price said Sunday.
“That is not something that the president is willing to do. It’s not something that he said he would do,” Price said of a clean repeal during an appearance on ABC’s “This Week.”
“Certainly what he has said is that repeal and replace need to occur essentially at the same time, concurrently, and that’s what we’re moving forward with in this first phase,” Price said.
Several members of the conservative House Freedom Caucus have called for a clean repeal and replace of Obamacare. They claim the current bill introduced by House Speaker Paul Ryan does not go far enough to erase elements of the healthcare law aside from the individual mandate.
“If we just repeal Obamacare, it’s not like life in the world goes back to life before Obamacare,” Ryan told House Republicans in a meeting earlier this month. “Obamacare did so much damage to the U.S. health insurance system that it’s not as if you can go back to the day before.”
