Former President Donald Trump campaigned in 2016 on a promise to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act, better known as Obamacare, but was spitefully prevented from doing so by some of his fellow Republicans, including most infamously the late Sen. John McCain (R-AZ), in the House and Senate.
Trump, now running again for re-election in 2024, has once more promised that coming up with a healthcare law replacement for Obamacare would be a top priority for him if re-elected as president, according to The Hill.
Whether Trump can find a suitable replacement plan, much less avoid being undermined in that effort by establishment Republicans in Congress, is a question that will remain unanswered for the time being.
On Monday, amid a flurry of posts to his Truth Social account, former President Trump once again took aim at replacing the signature healthcare law passed by his predecessor, former President Barack Obama.
"Obamacare is too expensive, and otherwise, not good healthcare. I will come up with a much better, and less expensive, alternative! People will be happy, not sad!" Trump wrote.
That was the shortened version of a video message he posted to Truth Social a few days earlier in which he spoke about his plan to ultimately repeal and replace Obamacare, as he had unsuccessfully attempted to do during his first term in office.
"I don't want to terminate Obamacare, I want to replace it with much better healthcare," Trump said in the video. "Health care that's absolutely better than what you have right now and also cheaper to you. So that's what we're going to do."
"Obamacare has been a disaster since the day it was conceived. We would've had it terminated were it not for John McCain and a couple of others," he added. "But that didn't happen so we're going to end up getting rid of Obamacare and replacing it with something much better and much less expensive to you."
The Hill reported that former President Trump's posts about replacing Obamacare in recent days was a continuation of his remarks last month that initially sparked some controversy when he spoke of his desire to "terminate" the eponymous healthcare law named after his Democratic predecessor.
"Getting much better Healthcare than Obamacare for the American people will be a priority of the Trump Administration," Trump posted in late November.
"It is not a matter of cost, it is a matter of HEALTH. America will have one of the best Healthcare Plans anywhere in the world. Right now it has one of the WORST!" he added at that time.
The Hill reported that while Republican cries of "repeal and replace" were once standard fare for Republicans concerning Obamacare, those calls have largely grown quiet following multiple failed attempts to do so as well as amid polling which shows that roughly 60% of Americans now favor the once-deeply unpopular healthcare law now that it has been fully in place for several years.
There is little doubt that former President Trump, if re-elected next year, will mount a renewed effort to get rid of and replace Obamacare, and will almost certainly have substantial support in attempting to do so from his GOP allies in Congress.
However, given how narrowly divided both chambers of the legislative body are, to say nothing of the bitter spitefulness of some of Trump's fellow Republicans who refuse to support him, it seems highly unlikely that it will ever actually happen -- unless, that is, Trump is capable of coming up with a real plan to replace Obamacare that could win over his detractors.
