Mike Johnson reveals Trump's "massive" changes to healthcare if re-elected
Bethlehem, Pennsylvania - House Speaker Mike Johnson recently vowed that presidential candidate Donald Trump will overturn the Affordable Care Act if he manages to win re-election.
According to NBC News, Johnson gave a speech at a Trump Force 47 campaign office in Pennsylvania on Monday while campaigning for GOP House candidate Ryan Mackenzie, in which he said that "massive" changes to health care will come if Trump wins.
"Healthcare reform's going to be a big part of the agenda. When I say we're going to have a very aggressive first 100 days agenda, we got a lot of things still on the table," Johnson explained.
When asked if that meant tossing Obamacare, Johnson confirmed as much and added, "The ACA is so deeply ingrained, we need massive reform to make this work, and we got a lot of ideas on how to do that."
"We want to take a blowtorch to the regulatory state. These agencies have been weaponized against the people," Johnson cotinued. "It's crushing the free market; it's like a boot on the neck of job creators and entrepreneurs and risk-takers.
"And so healthcare is one of the sectors, and we need this across the board, and Trump's going to go big," he added. "I mean, he's only going to have one more term. Can't run for re-election. And so he's going to be thinking about legacy, and we're going to fix these things."
Does Trump have a plan that would replace Obamacare?
Johnson's comments come as Trump's Democratic rival, Kamala Harris, has made healthcare a focus of her campaign. She has regularly accused Trump of planning to get rid of the ACA, which would be extremely detrimental to the nearly 50 million people who have signed up for the plan since it was enacted.
During his presidency, Trump attempted – but failed – to overturn the ACA. He has signaled that if he wins, he would try again, but when asked about what his replacement would look like during his debate with Harris, he could only insist that he has "concepts of a plan."
Johnson argued during his event that taking "government bureaucrats" out of healthcare would best represent a free market, adding that "Trump's going to be for the free market."
Cover photo: SAMUEL CORUM / AFP