Democrats gladly own the Affordable Care Act: #tellusatoday

Letter to the editor:

After having the proposed “repeal and replace” legislation (American Health Care Act) pulled before the vote in the House of Representatives, President Trump said the real losers were House Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi and Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumer. Obviously, Trump didn’t blame himself or his administration — specifically Vice President Pence, Health and Human Services Secretary Tom Price, House Speaker Paul Ryan, House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy or House Majority Whip Steve Scalise — for their inability to structure a bill that could garner the votes of a majority of House members. Then, after this strange statement, the president added, “Now they own Obamacare.”

Since the Affordable Care Act became the law of the land in 2010, the Republican in the House have, for more than 50 times, tried to pass legislation to “repeal Obamacare” in some way or another. Now when there is every reason to believe that the Republican-controlled Congress would be able to vote on a bill, get it through a conference committee and to the president for signature, Republicans could not get their act together and structure a “winning” bill.

As I see it, based on history, only Democrats have ever “owned Obamacare” or wanted to do so.

Michael Vezeau; Bluffton, S.C.

Facebook comments are edited for clarity and grammar:

Republicans and President Trump brought this upon themselves. I shed no tear for them, nor do I give accolades to the Democrats.

Washington dysfunction continues right now. Whoever thought Trump could fix it was delusional. Hillary Clinton would have been just as bad.

We need to get true leaders in Washington. There have been scant and few for a long, long time. We really do need to drain the swamp, starting with Trump and his cronies.

— Bill Boyd

Blaming the defeat of the bill on Democrats’ refusal to support the bill? Wow! It’s everybody else’s fault. Write law better than Obamacare and Democrats will support it.

— Chris Reising

Kiss the Republican reign goodbye when midterm elections come around. What a joke.

— Scott Lawrence

Let Obamacare die on its own. That trainwreck has caused enough problems for people already.

— Thomas Davis

Our followers shared their thoughts on Republicans’ failure to repeal the Affordable Care Act. Tweets are edited for clarity and grammar:

Proof you can’t bully everyone, only the cowards. Sorry, President Trump, but today we spoke.

— @sandyjean809

The entire Obamacare repeal drive by the GOP has been more of a personal vendetta than a “best for the U.S.” movement.

— @joesmith127

I’m so glad they’re listening to the people.

— @traceyjacobson5

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