The Congressional Budget Office's numbers on the American Healthcare Act are "false," but then again, "they've been wrong on so many things," Office of Management and Budget Director Mick Mulvaney said Thursday.
"I think that the CBO predicted it would be warm and sunny here today in Washington, D.C., [and] as you can see behind me, it's pouring rain here," Mulvaney told Fox News' "Fox & Friends" program.
"I think [they said] 24 million people would be covered on Obamacare by this year. They missed that by 12 or 13 million people. They said that Obamacare would be making money for the government by now. They missed that by several tens of billions of dollars."
The CBO on Wednesday said it estimated 23 million people will lose health coverage by 2026 under the Republican repeal legislation, but Mulvaney said the nonpartisan office's methodology was wrong.
"If you look at the methodology, they assume that folks who were on Medicaid, which is free, will choose to get off Medicaid when the mandate goes away," said Mulvaney. "Now you tell me if that sounds like the real world."
Under Obamacare, he continued, the average increases were more than 100 percent, with many states having a 200 percent increase, and that's what the AHCA should be compared to.
Instead, the comparison is being made to "some ideal of what the folks at the CBO or the Democratic Party wants Obamacare to be."
Meanwhile, Obamacare is doing a "great job of sabotaging itself," said Mulvaney.
"We knew Obamacare wouldn't work," he commented. "There were many of us who thought it was designed not to work, to push us towards a single payer system. This is exactly what we thought Obamacare was going to do."
Mulvaney also hit back at Democrats who are complaining about Trump's blueprint budget plan, saying that people are reading issues into it that don't exist.
"It's so frustrating, but I'm glad to sit here and talk about one thing that we're doing, which is defend the taxpayer," said Mulvaney. "It's a taxpayer-first budget, and that's how we wrote it."
Trump's budget plan calls for cuts to several programs for the poor, including healthcare and food stamps, but Mulvaney said the plan takes care of the "truly needy."
"We make sure folks who need help get it," said Mulvaney. "They told me that I should try to make news this morning. So let me see if I can make news. Republicans care about poor people. Republicans care about kids. Republicans care about the elderly, just like many Democrats care about national defense."
Further, he pointed out, the budget does increase spending on Medicaid and other items, just not "as fast as Congress wants to."
"Remember, in Washington, D.C., if you spent $100 on something this year, and $104 last year, they call that a cut, which is outrageous," Mulvaney said.