Donald Trump wins the White House: ACA health reform is in his hands now
Donald Trump on Tuesday night surprised many Americans by winning the 2016 presidential election. Among his many campaign promises was to ask Congress to repeal President Barack Obama's Affordable Care Act on day one of a Trump administration.
During his acceptance speech, in fact, President-elect Trump promised to improve several aspects of the national landscape.
"We are going to fix our inner cities and rebuild our highways, bridges, tunnels, airports, schools, hospitals," Trump said. "We’re going to rebuild our infrastructure, which will become, by the way, second to none. And we will put millions of our people to work as we rebuild it. We will also finally take care of our great veterans."
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That continued the promises Trump made on the campaign trail. He vowed this summer at the Republican National Convention to enable Americans to choose their doctor again, and he said during the debates with Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton that Obamacare will die of its own weight if it is not repealed.
When Trump takes office in January, both the U.S. Senate and House of Representatives will be controlled by Republicans but it is not certain that an Obamacare repeal would pass. The House has a long history of passing legislation to repeal the ACA in one fashion or another. So far, those bills – more than 60 of them – ultimately died on the Senate floor.
Whether that will change under Trump remains to be seen, of course. The mix of Democratic and Republican Senators, 51-47, is tighter than the House’s 239-193 split — meaning it still won't be a slam-dunk to pass such legislation in the Senate.
One thing for certain, however, is that Trump will try to change the Affordable Care Act's fate in one fashion or another.
"It is not enough to simply repeal this terrible legislation," he explained in his healthcare reform plan. "We will work with Congress to make sure we have a series of reforms ready for implementation that follow free market principles and that will restore economic freedom and certainty to everyone in this country.
"By following free market principles and working together to create sound public policy that will broaden healthcare access, make healthcare more affordable and improve the quality of the care available to all Americans," he said.
HIMSS will be offering a webinar on November 15: The 2016 Election Results: Exploring the Impact on Health IT Policy which will discuss potential changes to national healthcare and health IT policy.
Twitter: @SullyHIT
Email the writer: tom.sullivan@himssmedia.com
