By Brandon Moseley
Alabama Political Reporter
Sunday, May 7, 2017, US Senator Luther Strange (R-Alabama) said that the Senate is going to change the American Health Care Act that recently passed out of the US House of Representatives.
Sen. Strange said that in the US Senate, the bill will change and, “Well, it could be a lot. We are now analyzing what the House did.” Sen. Strange called the House bill, “A first step.”
Sen Strange said, “I am focused on Alabama and I just returned from my home State earlier today and people in my state are concerned. Obamacare is not providing the care that they expected and there are certainly a lot of problems we have to address.”
Sen. Strange appeared Sunday on the Fox News Channel’s America’s News HQ. Sen. Strange discussed the next steps the Senate must take in order to repeal and replace Obamacare.
Strange said, “I run into people all the time in my State who have “coverage”, but they don’t have access to care. They pay a tremendously high premium, they have a deductible they can almost never use, they can’t get affordable drug coverage, and so ultimately what you have is some sort of catastrophic policy. What we want is a compassionate policy that allows people to be covered and get care that they want — not that the government mandates that they have, but they want and that they can afford.”
Strange said that “I don’t think that anybody on our side is going to support a proposal” eliminating the ‘no pre-existing conditions’ protection in Obamacare as the House bill did. “WE will absolutely be addressing that Sen. Strange said, that while he wanted it to get done quickly, but We need to take our time. My concern is more getting it right than getting it done quickly.”
Strange said that in the healthcare bill, “I am looking for conservative commonsense solutions that work on the ground an really address the people’s needs.”
Strange was hopeful that the Senate could craft, “A compromise in the Senate that the President can work with and the House can deal with.”
The Senator did say however that, “It will get done.”
Click here to see Senator Strange’s interview in its entirety.
The American Health Care Act of 2017 was originally written by Speaker of the House Paul Ryan (R-Wisconsin) and a small carefully selected groups of Republican Congress members. That proposal was rejected however by conservative members of the House Freedom Caucus. Last week a compromise more conservative proposal did pass out of the House of Representatives. That measure is being widely criticized in the mainstream media.
Republicans have promised the American people that they will repeal and replace the unpopular Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act of 2010 (Obamacare) for years. Exactly what that replacement will look like is something the Senate will have to decide.
