Johnson tries to backtrack after 'no Obamacare' backlash

31 October 2024

Speaker Mike Johnson is now insisting that when he told supporters “no Obamacare,” he wasn’t suggesting that Republicans would push to repeal the Affordable Care Act. His remarks sparked a massive backlash online.

On Monday, in the hotly-contested battleground state of Pennsylvania, Johnson had said “no Obamacare,” referring to the Affordable Care Act, which covers tens of millions of Americans, has dramatically slashed the number of uninsured Americans, and offers widespread protections to over 133 million people in America.

“Health care reform’s going to be a big part of the agenda. When I say we’re going to have a very aggressive first 100 days agenda, we got a lot of things still on the table,” Speaker Johnson told an attendee at a GOP candidate’s meeting, according to an NBC News report and video Tuesday.

“We have a ‘docs caucus,’ physicians who serve in the House, and they’ve got a menu of options about this thick and I think this is part of it, because if you take government bureaucrats out of the health care equation and you have doctor-patient relationships, it’s better for everybody, more efficient, more effective, that’s the free market,” Johnson explained. “Trump’s gonna be for the free market.”

Johnson did not explain how Obamacare (or any federal health care system, including Medicare) could survive without “government bureaucrats.”

“No Obamacare?” an attendee asked.

“No Obamacare,” Johnson responded, raising his eyes before explaining how Donald Trump wants to “go big” in removing regulations.

“We want to take a blowtorch to the regulatory state,” Johnson said. “These agencies have been weaponized against the people, it’s crushing the free market; it’s like a boot on the neck of job creators and entrepreneurs and risk takers. And so health care is one of the sectors but we need this across the board.”

“And Trump’s going to go big. I mean, he’s only going to have one more term, right? Can’t run for re-election. And so he’s going to be thinking about legacy and we’re going to fix these things.”

NBC News’ Sahil Kapur on Wednesday reported Johnson’s office pushed back after the Harris campaign issued a statement citing Johnson’s remarks. But Kapur also noted that Donald Trump has said he wants to kill Obamacare.

“And remember,” Kapur said on “Morning Joe,” “all of this comes in context of Donald Trump promising to replace the ACA to finish the job he tried and failed in his first term when he attempted with Mike Johnson’s help to pass a bill that would roll back the 2010 law.”

Late Thursday morning Donald Trump posted an angry statement on his Truth Social website:

“Lyin’ Kamala is giving a News Conference now, saying that I want to end the Affordable Care Act. I never mentioned doing that, never even thought about such a thing. She also said I want to end Social Security. Likewise, never mentioned it, or thought of it. She is the one that wants to end Social Security and, she will do it, by putting the millions of Migrants coming into our Country into it. Kamala is a LIAR! Everything that comes out of her mouth is a LIE. It’s MADE UP FICTION, and she’s doing it because she’s losing, and losing BIG!”

Kapur notes, “As president, Trump fought to repeal ACA via legislation, undo regulations via executive action and nuke it via SCOTUS. Last month he called ACA ‘lousy’ and said ‘we’re going to replace it.'”

Also, as President, Trump celebrated when the House passed legislation repealing the entire Affordable Care Act, as the Biden administration’s Director of the Domestic Policy Council noted just hours ago:

Meanwhile, on Thursday, Johnson pushed back even harder, while complaining to Fox Business, “they’re twisting our words.”

“I was at one of these events in Pennsylvania a few days ago, and a question came up about Obamacare, and I answered it very specifically,” Johnson claimed, not mentioning he had said, “No Obamacare.”

“I said the ACA, unfortunately, is deeply ingrained in our health care system now. Do we need further improvements? Absolutely. We need to expand quality of care, access to care, and obviously lower the cost of healthcare. And I started talking about that. Well, they they took a clip out of context and said that I, said we were promising to repeal Obamacare.”

“That’s just not what I said, it’s actually the opposite of that,” Johnson continued to claim, “and so, that’s just another example of what, they have nothing to run on. They have no policies of their own, and they’re twisting our words.”

The Harris campaign has an entire section on issues, and over 80 pages of polices on its website.

Watch the video below or at this link.

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