Report: Trump Prepping Order To Gut Obamacare’s Individual Mandate

President Donald Trump speaks during a cabinet meeting at the White House in Washington, DC, on November 1, 2017. (Photo by Oliver Contreras)(Sipa via AP Images)
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The Trump administration is currently sitting on an executive order that would essentially gut Obamacare’s individual mandate—the pillar of the law that requires all Americans to purchase health insurance or pay a penalty, according to a report Monday in the Washington Examiner. The White House, however, denied the news, telling the Examiner the question of the mandate is “best resolved legislatively.”

Because the President is not legally able to repeal the individual mandate by executive action, the order would instead chip away at it by massively expanding the so-called “hardship exemptions” people can claim for not complying with the law. There are already 14 reasons people can get an exemption from the mandate, ranging from a death in the family to homelessness.

The White House would not comment on the rumored policy change, telling TPM: “We don’t get ahead of potential EOs until they’re ready to be announced.”

The Examiner reports that Trump has not yet signed the executive order because the administration’s first choice is to pressure Congress to include a full repeal of the individual mandate in their tax bill—a gambit that so far has been unsuccessful as Republican lawmakers fear adding the controversial policy will doom the bill’s chances in the Senate.

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Notable Replies

  1. How many other “exemptions” can he possibly create?!

  2. The increase in the number of Americans with no health insurance will accelerate under Don the Con and his crooked GOP Congress. They can’t plausibly blame anyone but themselves, and voters (other than the hardcore Trump followers, who are unreachable) will remember who are the saboteurs.

  3. The fools that voted for Don and his band of congressional thieves will vote for them again. They never seem to learn and they are easily frightened by Republican lies. I would wager that the ‘garbage fire’ president might even have a shot for a second term.

  4. Cruelty, thy name is trump.

    Evil Puke.

  5. A child left home alone with a book of matches.

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