Trump and Republicans May Support Obamacare Alternative That Doesn’t Fund Abortions

President Donald Trump and congressional Republicans are working on devising an alternative to expiring health care subsidies favored by Democrats, in an effort not to fund abortion and gender transition procedures. Existing Affordable Care Act subsidies are slated to expire at the end of the year. While Republican congressmen are reluctant to extend those subsidies as they stand, the president has yet to suggest an alternative means of keeping health care costs down without funding abortion and gender transition procedures, as the ACA subsidies would require in their present form.

According to a report from Politico, the president was considering placing income caps on those receiving ACA subsidies, requiring minimum premium payments, and potentially introducing an option for ACA subsidy recipients to “receive part of their tax credit in a tax-advantaged savings account if they downgrade to a lower-premium health plan.” However, congressional Republicans want any alternative plan to adhere to the stipulations of the Hyde Amendment, which bars federal taxpayer dollars from being used to fund abortions.

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On Tuesday night’s episode of “Washington Watch,” Rep. Eric Burlison (R-Mo.) explained, “I’ve said, you know, strategically, I don’t know how we could possibly — even if we were okay with extending these stupid subsidies, that go to insurance companies, by the way, not to people — even if we were okay with that, we’re not okay with allowing those to be spent on abortions.” He continued, “And so we would have to have some kind of Hyde language in there, which means that we’ll lose all the Democrats’ votes” when trying to extend the reformed ACA subsidies. “And now you’re talking about a reconciliation package, potentially. And if you’re going to do that, you might as well do what the American people want and pass a Republican solution, not just a patchwork on Obamacare.”

White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt did not commit the president to any particular alternative program in a Monday press conference, instead suggesting that the president may support extending modified ACA subsidies or may propose a completely different plan altogether.

Burlison posited that the president should present his own program, instead of attempting to modify the ACA. “What I would suggest, just politically, [is] that we should not touch the ACA, the Affordable Care Act, or any of those plans. We shouldn’t touch, really, any of the insurance products that exist today,” the Missouri congressman recommended. “What we really need to do is create a new product that Trump can rally behind that simply gives people the freedom or the choice to choose,” he insisted. “The way this would work: every American can have a MAHA account and they can fund that account with their own tax free dollars, or their employer can get the tax deduction and fund it with their money or combination thereof,” he explained, referring to the “Make America Healthy Again” agenda touted by the president and Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. “From that account, you’re able to purchase a direct primary care, you’re able to purchase any insurance product, and I mean any insurance product that you want — if you want to do health sharing plans, if you want to do an association plan, if you want to buy Obamacare through your MAHA account, you can.”

“I wouldn’t recommend it,” Burlison quipped in reference to purchasing Obamacare. “I don’t think anybody would be that foolish, but they will give you so many options that the American people will finally be able to choose which network that they belong to, which doctors that they are in network with,” he explained. “If they don’t like a PBM or prescription drug management program, they can choose to [not] have one at all or pick a different one. This will suddenly put all of this decision matrix in the hands of the consumer, and suddenly you’ll start seeing price transparency, because doctors and hospitals, they’ll understand that if they want to get people’s business, they’ll have to do that.”

LifeNews Note: S.A. McCarthy serves as a news writer at The Washington Stand.