Obamacare must be repealed and replaced quickly, as it is failing, House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy said Monday, while downplaying reports that it could take several years before change is made.
"Premiums are skyrocketing and insurers are pulling out of the network," the California Republican said during a Fox News' "America's Newsroom" interview. "Individuals see time and time again the failure of it."
McCarthy said he sent a letter out last week to the nation's governors and insurance commissioners to gather their ideas as well, as the nation needs a new approach when it comes to healthcare, but he's not putting a timeline on the repeal and replace measures.
"I want to make sure we get it done right," he said, while wanting to start the process as soon as lawmakers are sworn in.
McCarthy said the incoming Republican Congress will also be looking to removing several Obama administration executive orders that are harming the nation's businesses.
"The first thing we'll stop is the idea of more regulations compounding on you," said McCarthy. "The Obama administration has enacted or proposed 500 major rulings. A major ruling costs more than $100 million. The whole concept of business thinking a new one coming on and time and again, I think that is going to stop."
The government should help create jobs, he said, not to burden businesses and push them into going to another country.
President-elect Donald Trump has threatened a 35 percent income tax on goods being made by American companies that go to foreign countries and then try to sell their merchandise in the United States, and McCarthy said that is something that will need to be examined.
"What the president-elect is talking about, is how to create more jobs here," said McCarthy. "If we lower the taxes to make more incentive to be in America, we could achieve that goal."
Meanwhile, the majority leader said he has a "great relationship" with Trump, and was a delegate to the Republican National Convention this summer.
"We talk about a lot of ideas and the way going forward," said McCarthy. "He is handling the administration right away. He is ahead of schedule making a new Cabinet he is taking the time.
"I think the point America is not seeing, he is being a little Lincolnesque [by] looking at people that did not support him or criticize him."
Sandy Fitzgerald ✉
Sandy Fitzgerald has more than three decades in journalism and serves as a general assignment writer for Newsmax covering news, media, and politics.
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