Morning Briefing
Summaries of health policy coverage from major news organizations
Citing Complicated Nature Of Replacement, Trump Walks Back Promised Deadline
President Trump said in an interview that aired on Sunday that a replacement health care law was not likely to be ready until either the end of this year or in 2018, a major shift from promises by both him and Republican leaders to repeal and replace the law as soon as possible. (Landler, 2/5)
President Donald Trump walked back his recent vow that Obamacare would be replaced in short order, telling Fox News鈥 Bill O鈥橰eilly that the process is 鈥渃omplicated鈥 and 鈥渕aybe it鈥檒l take till sometime into next year.鈥 "It statutorily takes a while to get," Trump said in a wide-ranging interview that aired Sunday during the Super Bowl pre-game show. "We鈥檙e going to be putting it in fairly soon, I think that yes I would like to say by the end of the year at least the rudiments, but we should have something within the year and the following year." (Palmeri, 2/5)
Trump said in January that he鈥檇 put forward his plans for replacing the law, also called Obamacare, once Tom Price, his pick to run the Department of Health and Human Services, is confirmed. 鈥淲e鈥檙e going to be submitting, as soon as our secretary is approved, almost simultaneously, shortly thereafter, a plan,鈥 Trump said at a Jan. 11 press conference. 鈥淚t鈥檒l be repeal and replace. It will be essentially simultaneously.鈥 (Tracer, 2/5)