The opposition Democratic Party is willing to work with the White House and the Republicans to improve Obamacare, but repealing the affordable healthcare act is off the table, a top Democrat said today.
"We have ideas, they have ideas to try to improve Obamacare. We never said it was perfect. We always said we would work with them to improve it. We just said repeal was off the table," Senate Minority Leader Senator Chares Schumer told ABC News.
On Friday, House Speaker Paul Ryan pulled out vote on a legislation to repeal and replace Obamacare as he was unable to muster enough votes to get it through the Congress. This was considered a major setback for US President Donald Trump, as this was one of his major poll promises.
The Democrats have blamed Trump for not consulting them on the issue.
"The bottom line is very simple. President never called us once about this. They came on board with repeal, which they knew every Democrat would oppose, and no one believes that, but I would say this, we Democrats, provided our Republican colleagues drop replace and stop undermining the Affordable Care Act (ACA), are willing to work with our Republican friends... As long as they say no more repeal.
"That is a loser. Seventeen per cent of Americans liked Trumpcare. They did not want it. Stop undermining ACA and we will work with them," Schumer said.
Trump has blamed the Democrats for the legislation not getting through the Congress, but the Democrats insisted that it was a "disastrous" legislation.
"The bill that was defeated should have been defeated. It was a disastrous piece of legislation primarily designed to provide USD 300 billion in tax breaks to the top two per cent, throwing 24 million people off of health insurance, raising premiums for older workers in a very, very significant way," Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders told CNN.
"It was defeated. The American people wanted it defeated. And I am glad that we were able to accomplish that. Now, as you indicated, of course, Obamacare has serious problems. Deductibles are too high. Premiums are too high. The cost of healthcare is going up at a much faster rate than it should," he said.
Sanders, a popular presidential candidate who lost to Hillary Clinton in the 2016 primaries, said he would soon introduce a Medicare-for-all single payer program.
He has already introduced a legislation to bring down the cost of prescription drugs.
Republican Senator from Ohio John Kasich, who was one of the major Trump opponents during primaries, said "you cannot have major changes in major programs affecting things like healthcare without including Democrats from the very beginning and asking them to be constructive".
However, the Republican Congressman Mark Meadows told ABC News that this was neither a defeat nor an end of the debate.
"The narrative that your panel is talking about in terms of defeat, you know, this was not a final passage, this was one bill that was going to go to the Senate, get revised and come back. If it was the final bill, that would be accurate," Meadows said.
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