President Donald Trump expanded this week on how he wants to overhaul the Affordable Care Act (ACA) and reshape the country’s health care subsidies.
The president is proposing a system that would direct funding into personal accounts for Americans to purchase their own coverage.
The 43-day government shutdown, which began Oct. 1 and ended Nov. 12, was driven in part by a dispute over ACA subsidies set to expire at the end of the year.
In a Truth Social post last week, Trump urged Senate Republicans to shift “hundreds of billions” of dollars away from insurance companies and toward accounts controlled by individuals.
Asked about the proposal during a Fox News interview this week, the president said he wants “the money to go into an account for people where the people buy their own health insurance.”
“The insurance will be better. It’ll cost less,” Trump told Fox News host Laura Ingraham.
“Everybody’s going to be happy.
“They’re going to feel like entrepreneurs.
“They’re actually able to go out and negotiate their own insurance.
“And they can use it only for that reason.
“That’s the beauty, only for the purpose,” he said.
“And if we did that, that would be so exciting.”
He added that the plan could be called “Trumpcare” or “whatever you want to call it.”
Trump criticized the ACA, which was signed in 2010 under former President Barack Obama.
He noted that “premiums have gone up like rocket ships,” and argued that any replacement program should avoid the Obamacare label entirely.
The president signed the government funding bill on Wednesday at the White House, officially ending the record-length shutdown just hours after the House passed the Senate’s measure in a 222–209 vote largely along party lines.
Democrats had pushed to extend an enhanced tax credit set to expire at the end of the year, insisting that lower-cost ACA marketplace plans depended on it.
They rejected a short-term funding bill that left the subsidy extension out, while Republicans maintained the issue should be debated separately from the shutdown.
Whether the two parties can find agreement before the December Senate vote remains uncertain.
House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) has declined to commit to bringing the matter to the floor.
Some Senate Republicans have signaled openness to extending the subsidies.
Sen. Josh Hawley (R-MO) warned in September that, without action, premiums could “skyrocket” and become unaffordable for many families.
Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX) said he believes Congress should scale back subsidies for high-income recipients.
Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services Administrator Mehmet Oz told Fox News earlier this week that the administration is preparing a policy to replace the outgoing subsidies.
“We have lots of great ideas,” Oz said.
“But I don’t want to show our cards.
“As the president often says, why would I telegraph to you what we’re going to do?”
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