(LifeSiteNews) — Over the weekend, the 2024 campaign of former President Donald Trump declared his intentions to keep the so-called Affordable Care Act (ACA), better known as Obamacare, “unless we can do something much better,” highlighting yet another shift from the agenda of previous Trump campaigns.
On September 7, Democratic opponent and current Vice President Kamala Harris posted on X (formerly Twitter), “Donald Trump intends to end the Affordable Care Act—which would take us back to a time where insurance companies had the power to deny people with preexisting conditions. We are not going back.”
The Trump campaign replied, “Kamala, quit lying,” with a video clip of Trump telling a crowd of supporters, “I am going to keep the Affordable Care Act unless we can do something much better. We’ll keep it, but we can do much better. It’s too expensive for the people, they can’t afford it, it’s lousy health care. If we can do something better, we’re working on it, we can do something better. But we will never let anybody touch it unless we have something better. We’re going to deliver lower prices, lower drug costs, and new options that will dramatically reduce the crushing burden on all American patients.”
Kamala, quit lying.
PRESIDENT TRUMP: I am going to keep the Affordable Care Act unless we can do something much better, and by better, I’m talking about better for YOU, not better for the government.pic.twitter.com/1NyYQ0lWby https://t.co/DRTlSKKZUo
— Trump War Room (@TrumpWarRoom) September 7, 2024
Trump campaigned in 2016 on repealing Obamacare, but despite taking office backed by a Republican Congress, he and the GOP failed to do so, due to a variety of factors, including lack of preparation by establishment GOP leaders such as former House Speaker Paul Ryan, Trump’s dismissal of conservative concerns about the details of the failed first draft, and the late moderate Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) casting the deciding vote against a replacement plan most other Republicans found acceptable. As his presidency went on, Trump used executive actions to mitigate some of Obamacare’s most objectionable aspects.
This is not the first time Trump has signaled a decidedly different view in his current campaign, oddly aligning himself with McCain’s decisive vote and even invoking far-left Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA).
Last December, he said at a campaign rally, “we’re going to fight to give much better healthcare than what you have right now, and this is a newer subject, but Obamacare is a disaster. And I said we’re going to we’re going to do something about it. I saved Obamacare when we got John McCain’s negative vote. You know, he voted against it after campaigning for many, many years. He said, ‘Uh thumbs down.’ That was an amazing night.”
“But we’re going to fix it because it’s a catastrophe for family budgets,” he continued. “Even Elizabeth ‘Pocahontas’ Warren, have you ever heard of her? Now she’s Pocahontas because of her great Indian heritage. She even said that it needs to be fixed. Pocahontas said it has to be fixed. So we’re going to fix it.”
Trump’s rewritten national Republican Party Platform, which he cites as his campaign platform on his campaign website, is light on details in most policy areas, but on the subject of healthcare says, “[h]ealthcare and prescription drug costs are out of control. Republicans will increase Transparency, promote Choice and Competition, and expand access to new Affordable Healthcare and prescription drug options. We will protect Medicare, and ensure Seniors receive the care they need without being burdened by excessive costs.” Promoting choice is inconsistent with some of Obamacare’s core features, an individual mandate to own health insurance and mandates for what health insurance must cover.
Last month, Trump proposed a new mandate of his own: “under the Trump Administration, your government will pay for, or your insurance company will be mandated to pay for, all costs associated with IVF treatment [sic], fertilization for women.” LifeSiteNews has estimated that Trump’s proposal could cause the killing of an additional 2.4 million embryonic children a year, while National Review argues that the proposal “would expand Obamacare” with “one of the most expensive benefits one can mandate,” dramatically spiking insurance premiums.
Healthcare is the latest issue on which Trump has shifted since the last time he was president, following his newfound opposition to federal preborn protections he previously supported, support for mailing abortion pills into pro-life states to be taken without medical oversight, support for legalizing recreational marijuana, opposition to banning TikTok, and proposal to give green cards to foreign community college graduates.
While such reversals have alarmed and frustrated many of Trump’s past supporters, his continued difference from Democrats on issues such as “transitioning” gender-confused minors and Harris and Democrats’ continued support for a comprehensive far-left policy agenda is expected to keep most conservatives and Republicans resigned to accepting him as preferable.
With both campaigns pledging to satisfy their respective bases in some ways while running to the center in others, polling aggregations by RealClearPolitics and RaceToTheWH continue to show Harris leading Trump in both national polling and Electoral College, although their standing has narrowed in recent days. Tuesday evening’s first presidential debate between the two is an opportunity for each candidate to reverse their fortunes.