Earlier this week, the House Republican leadership released a bill, the American Health Care Act (AHCA), to replace the Affordable Care Act (ACA). The AHCA does not repeal the ACA in its entirety, and in fact changes or keeps certain provisions of the law.

On Monday, The New York Times published a piece on how the current draft of the AHCA keeps, changes or discards parts of the ACA.

The Small Business Legislative Council (SBLC), of which PPAI is a member and for which PPAI President and CEO Paul Bellantone, CAE, serves as a board director, has issued an initial comment on the AHCA release. It stated: “Unlike the prior leaked draft, the AHCA does not include a cap on the exclusion for employer-sponsored health insurance premiums, which members of both parties had raised concerns about. However, the AHCA has already drawn criticism from the far right members of the Republican Party who see the proposal’s refundable tax credit as a welfare entitlement. Moreover, the AHCA includes significant cuts to Medicaid which could prove a sticking point in the Senate where it will need 50 votes to pass and, earlier this year, four Republican Senators (Capito, Gardener, Portman and Murkowski) signed a letter to Majority Leader Mitch McConnell expressing their opposition to significant Medicaid cuts. In other words, the debate over, and political challenges surrounding, the AHCA’s contents have only just begun.”