HHS Secretary Tom Price On AHCA

[Valin]

Hugh Hewitt Show:

Hugh Hewitt

Tuesday, March 21, 2017

 

Audio

 

(Snip)

 

HH: Representative Greg Walden was with me last hour, and he said Thursday’s vote in the House on the AHCA, he said, “This is the make or break vote. I’m not aware of any Plan B.” Do you agree with him, Secretary Price?

 

TP: Oh, yeah. I think we’re going to make this happen, and this is the next step in the process, and then it’ll move on over to the Senate, and we’ll continue to perfect it. And we’ve got so many opportunities from a legislative standpoint as well as what we’re able to do here at the department, it’s just an exciting time to be able to move our health care system in the direction that actually thinks about patients and those providing the care, as opposed to just government.

 

HH: Now I would vote for this bill if I were a member of the House, but I am following the Freedom Caucus. And Axios’ John Swann caught up with Mark Meadows last night, who said, “I’ve now reached a conclusion that our leadership will dare us to vote against this.” Is that in fact what’s going on? Have we reached the end of negotiations? Or is there still opportunities for amendments to the manager’s amendment?

 

TP: Well, I don’t know that there are opportunities at this point for amendments to the manager’s amendment. There are opportunities certainly in the Senate. At some point, you’ve got to put down the pens, and the hour is late. There were a number of amendments that were rolled out yesterday that address a lot of the concerns that people had, so the bill has moved, I think, in a better direction from a work requirement standpoint for states to give states that option to make certain that we’re addressing greater flexibility for certain states from a Medicaid standpoint to give the governors greater flexibility. We’ve done some things here at the department that I think are really important, and we’ll be addressing more of them this week and as the weeks roll by. So I think the plan, the overall plan, is moving in a good direction.

 

HH: Let me play for you the brief subject critique from the Senate side. This is Tom Cotton and Ted Cruz both saying the same thing, Tom Cotton on my show and Ted Cruz on Face the Nation.

 

(Snip)

[Valin]

Speaker Paul Ryan On The Status Of The AHCA
Hugh Hewitt
Wednesday, March 22, 2017

Audio

(Snip)

HH: And I’m hoping for that. But if you, this is just my advice to you. If changes are made, post it for three days and wait. What is the timeline after a successful House vote, Mr. Speaker?

 

PR: So we pass the bill, it goes to the Senate, and then the Senate has a, because of reconciliation, it limits debate so that they can’t endlessly drag it on forever, and they’ll take a week working on this. And they’ll take all of next week working on this bill, testing amendments, seeing what they can get into it past the Byrd Rule, and then next week, the Senate takes over and they basically start the process over that we did. So we are making changes, amendments, we go through four committees. They won’t go through four committees. They don’t, it doesn’t work like that over there. They’ll spend a week on the floor, and they call it voterama. They’ll have all these different amendment votes that they’ll take and try to pass to amend the bill. And so they’ll have a chance to rewrite the bill over there in the Senate, and our goal is to make it even better over there with our friends and allies in the Senate. Then they’ll send us the bill after that. And then they go on to Gorsuch. So we’ve got a pretty packed schedule between the two of us.

 

HH: But do you expect, yeah, assuming that they get you the bill back for the week of April the 3rd, do you expect a vote the week of April the 3rd on the final?

 

PR: Absolutely. Absolutely. Absolutely.

 

HH: So we will be done by Easter?

 

PR: Yes.

 

HH: We will repeal and replace Obamacare by Easter?

 

(Snip)

HH: You see, that would be huge, and I can’t stress to Republicans enough they’ve got to ask their members to support the Speaker on this, because it’s a disaster for Americans if they don’t get health care. It’s a disaster for the Republican Party if they don’t deliver. But now let me talk to you about the three phases, and let’s be blunt. I want to play for you some tape of your friend, Tom Cotton, and your friend, Ted Cruz, talking about phase three.

Tom Cotton: Hugh, there is no three phase process. There is no three step plan. That is just political talk. It’s just politicians engaging in spin.

Ted Cruz: I’ve called bucket three the sucker’s bucket.

HH: Okay, so Speaker Ryan, these are your friends.

PR: Yes, they are. And with friends like that, who needs, you know, you know the rest of the sentence.

HH: I know.

PR: I totally and fundamentally disagree. And first of all, why would we want to let Democrats off the hook with that kind of rhetoric, because all that does is it takes pressure off Democrats. Phase three are popular things that, like let’s just take association health plans. We just passed it here, or we’re just in the middle of passing it. And association health plans says let a farmer buy his insurance through the National Farm Bureau Plan. Let a restauranteur buy her insurance through a national association of restaurant plan. It’s interstate shopping for small businesses. It’s extremely popular, and Donald Trump is chomping at the bit to crisscross those ten states he won big where Democrats are up for reelection in 2018 and hammer them on this. Plus, there are things that Democrats want and need that will vote for, like the children’s health insurance law, which expires at the end of the fiscal year that we will combine in these bills to make them, to pass them. So I really, really believe we have a very good phase three plan. I’m not saying everything we want in phase three will go into law, but I think a lot of these things will go into law, because you have an extremely engaged president. These are popular provisions, popular provisions that the restaurant association, that entrepreneurs, small businesses, people want. And it’s going to be really, really, really hard for these Democrats in these red states who are up in 2018 to oppose those things. And why we would want to let them off the hook or take pressure off of them at this stage is beyond me. I don’t think that that’s important. But I think, I don’t think that that’s valuable. But I also think you take a step back and look at phase one and phase two. Phase one is the bill we’re talking about. Phase two is the incredible discretion in de-regulatory authority that Tom Price has that dramatically lowers the price of premiums. The insurers are already telling us just what they’ve already seen will lower premiums. The question is can we lower them even more with better things like phase three, and the answer is, I believe, yes.

HH: Okay, now I want to move…

PR: But to say that we’re not going to do something before we even try, to say to Democrats, we’re going to give you a pass and not put pressure on you, I think, is just a big mistake to make.

(Snip)