Nancy Pelosi, the House minority leader, said President Trump knows very little about the Affordable Care Act,
and called the proposed replacement plan “Robin Hood in reverse.”
But among those at the table with the president were Representative Mark Meadows of North Carolina, the chairman of the Freedom Caucus,
and Representative Jim Jordan of Ohio, two of the biggest obstacles to any health care bill deemed insufficiently thorough in obliterating the Affordable Care Act.
Representative Joe L. Barton, Republican of Texas, offered an amendment on Thursday
that would have moved the health care bill in a conservative direction, reducing federal funds for the Affordable Care Act’s expansion of Medicaid at the end of 2017, two years earlier than under the legislation drafted by House Republican leaders.
After Halting Start, Trump Plunges Into Effort to Repeal Health Law -
By MAGGIE HABERMAN and ROBERT PEARMARCH 9, 2017
WASHINGTON — President Trump, after a halting start, is now marshaling the full power of his office to win over holdout conservatives
and waffling senators to support the House Republicans’ replacement for the Affordable Care Act.
The proposal was supported by two influential conservative groups, the Republican Study Committee
and the House Freedom Caucus — and, he said, “the Trump administration is open to it.” Indeed, the White House has begun pushing for a 2017 end to the Medicaid expansion, a senior Trump adviser confirmed — a move that risks pushing away moderates across Congress.
And it will allow Mr. Trump to make good on a pledge he made in rally after rally in 2016 to replace Mr. Obama’s law, which he called a “disaster.”
On Thursday, two key House committees approved the legislation, which would undo the Affordable Care Act
and replace it with a more modest system of tax credits and a rollback of Mr. Obama’s Medicaid expansion.