The editors conclude that Republicans "should propose that the federal government both remove many of Obamacare's regulations and redirect the money now flowing to Obamacare's exchanges and its Medicaid expansions to state governments, which would then determine how to spend it to meet their residents' health-care needs".
After the administration kicked off the week with its surprise shift to supporting the invalidation of the Affordable Care Act in the Texas case, Trump has been beating the drum constantly, thrusting the thorny issue into the center of the political arena even as federal judges in other cases ruled against him. Those that have been set up are now in limbo - a Justice Department spokeswoman said after Bates' ruling that the administration is "considering all available options", including an appeal. Trump said last week his subordinates were 'working on a plan now'.
It is not yet clear what type of plan the administration believes could clear the Democratic House and GOP-controlled Senate.
The President said Thursday he had tasked a handful of Republican senators with cobbling together an Obamacare replacement. According to a new Urban Institute study, abolishing the ACA without anything to replace it would cause 20 million Americans to lose their health insurance. The president repeatedly grouses that it was the fault of the late Sen.
Just a day earlier, Marc Short, Vice President Mike Pence's chief of staff and the former White House legislative affairs director, claimed on CNN that "the President will be putting forward plans this year" to replace Obamacare through Congress. You're gonna take that away from them?
"Indeed, as the President directed, and the Secretary of Labor confirmed, the Final Rule was created to expand access to AHPs in order to avoid the most stringent requirements of the ACA", he wrote, using the acronym for the 2010 health care law.