Scalise on Fox Business: AHCA Will 'Put Patients Back In Charge'

WASHINGTON, D.C.— Majority Whip Steve Scalise (R-La.) joined Neil Cavuto on Fox Business Channel today following yesterday’s passage of the American Health Care Act to discuss pre-existing conditions, fixing Obamacare’s broken promises, the budget reconciliation process, and continuous coverage.

Click here or on the image above to watch the interview.

Remarks:

On pre-existing conditions…

“What's most important is following through on our promise and lowering premiums to put patients back in charge of their health care decisions. Our bill does that while protecting people with pre-existing conditions, and it's a really good bill. If the Senate wants to make it even better, I encourage them to do that."

On fixing Obamacare’s broken promises…

"[Democrats] have been the party of broken promises, from Obamacare’s promises that were all broken [like] 'if you like what you have, you can keep it' [and] 'prices will be lower'. People are paying double-digit increases. Iowa just lost their entire health care marketplace. If you're on Obamacare, you literally will have nowhere to go to get health insurance, and we're seeing that play out in other states.

"Oh, by the way, when they say people with pre-existing conditions will be hung out to dry, in our bill we have multiple layers of protection for people with pre-existing conditions who don't have those protections in Obamacare. So if you want premiums to go down, you like our bill. If you want Obamacare and the double-digit increases every year and $12,000 deductibles, then, obviously, you wouldn't like our bill. At the end of the day, we have a mandate to follow this, and President Trump has been very clear from the beginning he wants to lower premiums for families. Our bill does that."

On using the budget reconciliation process to pass the American Health Care Act…

"We approached this repeal and replace bill through the budget reconciliation process because that allows you to move a bill through the Senate with 51 votes. We want to do the same thing with tax reform, and you can only have one of those bills moving at a time. We moved to Obamacare first, then move to tax reform. Let's make our country competitive and lower our overall rates. That's going to jump-start the economy like nothing we've seen in decades."

On continuous coverage…

"The first layer of protection is what's called continuous coverage, meaning if you have insurance today, as long as you keep insurance even if you go from one plan to another, if you lose your job and you go to Medicaid and then you go back into the workforce, all of that means you're continuously covered. You will never be rated differently than you are today.

…

"If you're in a state that would request a waiver under our plan, one of the extra protections we put in, and this was one of the final amendments to come in, the Upton/Billy Long amendment, adds $8 billion of extra money just for those states that would want to waive that protection. And, by the way, you can't waive the protection of pre-existing conditions. But if you were not insured at all, we put $8 billion in place so you can actually come back into the marketplace at competitive rates, and then you're covered. And you’d be continuously covered as long as you maintain it."

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