Bill Clinton took a moment Tuesday afternoon during a campaign rally to clarify what he meant when he said this week that the Affordable Care Act is a “crazy system” in which small businesses are “getting killed.”
“Look, the Affordable Health Care Act did a world of good, and the 50-something efforts to repeal it that the Republicans have … were a terrible mistake,” Clinton said during a campaign stop in Athens, Ohio.
“We for the first time in our history at least are providing insurance to more than 90 percent of our people,” he said.
The former president raised eyebrows Monday after he said the Affordable Care Act is the “the craziest thing in the world.”
The healthcare law works fine, “if you’re eligible for Medicaid, if you’re a lower-income working person, if you’re already on Medicare or if you get enough subsidies on a modest income that you can afford your healthcare,” Clinton said Monday.
Compared to what the country used to have, the Affordable Care Act is a good deal, he said. However, he added, it’s not a perfect system, especially if you’re a small business owner.
“The people who are getting killed in this deal are small business people and individuals who make just a little too much to get any of these subsidies. Why? Because they’re not organized and they don’t have any bargaining power with insurance companies and they’re getting whacked,” Clinton said.
“So you got this crazy system where all of a sudden 25 million more people have healthcare, and then the people are out there busting it, sometimes 60 hours a week, wind up with their premiums doubled and their coverage cut in half,” Clinton added. “It’s the craziest thing in the world.”
The simplest solution, Clinton said, would be to figure out an affordable rate and let people use that, and to let people who are “above the line” have access to “affordable entry into the Medicare and Medicaid programs.”
White House press secretary Josh Earnest responded to Clinton’s remarks Monday, conceding that parts of the healthcare law need to be revisited.
“What I would also say is that since the very first day the president signed this bill into law, he acknowledged an openness to working with Democrats or Republicans in Congress to further strengthen it,” Earnest said.
“And we have seen a sustained commitment on the part of Republicans to try to tear down that law,” he said.
Hillary Clinton has promised that her administration would defend the law from the GOP’s efforts to repeal it, but she has also conceded there are some fixes that need to be made.
