Rep. Henry Cuellar (D-TX) sounds like an old commercial for pasta sauce these days. With less than 24 hours to go before the Republicans take over in the House and begin their quest to repeal and replace the Democrats’ landmark health care reform law, Cuellar — a new member of the House minority leadership — told reporters today that whatever reforms the Republicans want to put in place as part of the “replace” portion of their agenda, the Democrats have already done it.
In essence, to paraphrase Prego, “it’s in there.”
At the House Democratic majority leadership’s final press conference before Speaker Boehner and company are sworn in tomorrow, Cuellar read through the succinct health care “replace” bill House Republicans are planning to introduce this week. The bill is essentially a list of instructions for newly Republican-run committees to take up health care reform once (in theory) the Democratic law is repealed.
For each directive on the bill — “preserve a patient’s ability to keep his or her health plan if he or she likes it” is one example — Cuellar had a simple response: we already did that.
Watch:
Regardless, it’s virtually impossible that the Republican replace law, or the plan to repeal the Democratic law, will come to pass as long as Democrats control the Senate and the White House.
