What Trump Will Do About Health Insurance? President 'Guarantees' Pre-Existing Conditions Will Be Covered

In an interview marking his first 100 days in office, President Donald Trump says the latest iteration of health care reform will provide coverage for pre-existing conditions, guaranteed.

On CBS’s “Face the Nation” Sunday, Trump said Obamacare “is dead,” making it imperative for Republicans to pass a measure to replace it, giving the states more authority over provisions and, in the second phase, competition across state lines to drive down premiums.

Since the last measure was pulled before the House could vote in March, Trump said the bill has evolved but there’s no timeline for passage.

Read: Vice President Mike Pence Admits Reducing Rates Will Swell Budget Hole

“We have pre-existing conditions. We have a pool so premiums will be allowed to fall. There will be such competition. Right now, there’s no competition. Groups of people can negotiate. Competition is going to drive down the premiums much, much more than people will understand,” Trump pledged, adding there were provisions in the last version “that were not as good,” and there will be “guarantees” in the next version on pre-existing conditions, something that should placate moderates who worried their constituents would suffer.

The original bill was virtually scuttled by the arch-conservative Freedom Caucus, which complained the bill didn’t do enough to dismantle former President Barack Obama’s signature legislative achievement, deriding the measure as “Obamacare-lite.”

Read: 9 Times Trump Accused China Of Currency Manipulation — But Not Now

Trump said he’d rather have the federal government “focused on North Korea, focused on other things than your knee or your back.”

Before the interview aired, Trump took to Twitter to make his point.

He also labeled Democrats the party of “no,” just like the Republicans were labeled during the Obama years.

House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., disputed that in an interview on ABC’s “This Week,” saying few Americans support the health care measure being proposed.

The House voted more than 50 times to repeal the Affordable Care Act during the Obama administration but GOP leaders didn’t have a bill ready to replace it when it seized control of Congress and the White House in the Nov. 8 elections.

During the presidential campaign, Trump promised to repeal Obamacare “on day one.”

Republican leaders are hoping to bring the latest bill to a vote this week but won’t call it until there’s enough support to pass it. The problem is getting something that is acceptable to both the Freedom Caucus and moderates, known as the Tuesday Group.

“It’d be hard,” Rep. Charlie Dent, R-Pa., told the Hill. “I’m not aware of any members of the Tuesday Group who were a ‘no’ and became a ‘yes’ because of it.”

On NBC’s “Meet the Press,” however, Vice President Mike Pence said he thinks “repealing and replacing Obamacare is just around the corner.”

Pence, who has been deeply involved in negotiations over the bill, said action needs to be taken because “there are states around the country where literally people in half the state have no choice for health insurance at all.”

To keep premiums from skyrocketing, Pence said Republicans “basically borrowing an idea from the state of Maine that has seen a significant drop in premiums for people on their health insurance because you take people that have pre-existing and costly conditions and put them into a high-risk pool.

“And you subsidize that so that it is affordable to those individuals. And so, you're guaranteeing coverage for pre-existing conditions. And the flexibility that you're referring to in this latest MacArthur Amendment, states can only apply for that waiver and flexibility if they have either a federal or state high-risk pool that guarantees that people will be able to have coverage, and it'll be affordable.”

An ABC/Washington Post poll published last week indicated 61 percent of Americans now favor fixing Obamacare rather than repealing and replacing it, with 70 percent saying pre-existing conditions should be covered — even 54 percent of Republicans agreed — and 62 percent favoring minimum nationwide standards for coverage.