With the deeply unpopular health care plan having failed to come to a vote before the Senate recessed for the holidays, demonstrators across the country flooded the offices of Republicans in what they’re calling a “last stand” to prevent a repeal of the Affordable Care Act. We speak with disability rights attorney Stephanie Woodward, who was shown in a viral video being pulled out of her wheelchair and arrested for protesting outside Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell’s office.
TRANSCRIPT
AMY GOODMAN: President Trump urged the Republican Congress today to repeal the Affordable Care Act, even as senators recessed for the holidays early yesterday, with no plans in sight to vote on a replacement healthcare bill. In a tweet early this morning, President Trump tweeted, “If Republican Senators are unable to pass what they are working on now, they should immediately REPEAL, and then REPLACE at a later date!” unquote. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell called off a planned vote on the Senate healthcare bill after some members of his party balked over a Congressional Budget Office report that found it would add 22 million Americans to the ranks of the uninsured. Other Republicans said they’d oppose the Senate bill because it doesn’t go far enough.
Meanwhile, support for a nationwide single-payer healthcare system is growing. Massachusetts Senator Elizabeth Warren became the latest politician to back single payer. In an interview with The Wall Street Journal Tuesday, Warren said, quote, “President Obama tried to move us forward with health-care coverage by using a conservative model that came from one of the conservative think tanks that had been advanced by a Republican governor in Massachusetts. Now it’s time for the next step. And the next step is single payer,” she said. Billionaire investor Warren Buffett also came out in favor of single payer this week, saying, quote, “We are such a rich country. In a sense, we can afford to do it,” unquote. A recent poll by the Pew…