WASHINGTON (dpa-AFX) - Senate Health Committee Chairman Lamar Alexander, R-Tenn., and ranking member Patty Murray, D-Wash., announced Thursday that twenty-two other Senators are cosponsoring their bipartisan plan to provide short-term stability to Obamacare.
The bipartisan bill includes a two-year extension of the cost-sharing reduction payments to insurers that President Donald Trump eliminated last week.
In exchange, the legislation provides states with new flexibility to create insurance policies that have a larger variety and lower costs.
Alexander noted that every Republican in the House who voted to repeal and replace Obamacare this year voted for a provision that continued the CSR payments for two years.
However, President Donald Trump has described the payments as a bailout to insurance companies, and the White House has indicated the president opposes the Alexander-Murray plan in its current form.
Trump's opposition to the legislation comes despite comments initially describing the plan as a 'very good solution.'
'The president says there should be no bailout of insurance companies,' Alexander said in remarks on the Senate floor. 'I agree 100 percent. So does Senator Murray.'
He added, 'We have a page and a half to make it clear that insurance companies cannot 'double dip,' so the benefits go to consumers not insurance companies.'
Murray described the bill as a bipartisan solution that prevents families from paying the price for sabotage and uncertainty caused by Trump's executive actions.
The twenty-two additional cosponsors of the bill include twelve Republican Senators, nine Democratic Senators, and Independent Senator Angus King, I-Maine.
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