The GOP's Obamacare Agenda Just Reemerged From Hiding

Here's how to interpret what Republicans have been saying about the Affordable Care Act and prescription drugs.

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Health care has been invisible for most of the presidential campaign. That changed at last week’s presidential debate, when Donald Trump answered a question about his intentions on the Affordable Care Act (aka Obamacare).

First Trump claimed to have “saved” the 2010 health care law despite having spent the first year of his presidency trying to repeal it. Then he promised that he had “concepts of a plan” for replacing it.

Trump didn’t specify what these concepts were, which was nothing new. The Republican presidential nominee has been promising a mythical, never-defined plan that will provide “great health care for much less money” since he first started talking about repealing Obamacare in his 2016 presidential campaign.

But over the weekend, his running mate, Sen. JD Vance of Ohio, said Trump actually did have an alternative. During an appearance on NBC’s “Meet the Press,” Vance said Trump had in mind a “deregulatory agenda so that people can choose a health care plan that fits them.”