Johnson speaks at a post-election press conference Nov. 12. Photo: Andrew Harnik/Getty Images
Speaker Mike Johnson shot down any talk of Affordable Care Act repeal at Tuesday night's House vote, saying "no one's talking" about getting rid of the law.
Why it matters: Johnson and President-elect Trump have given mixed signals about what they wanted to do with the ACA.
- Johnson's latest comments make it clear he, at least, has no interest in another repeal attempt even after Republicans' strong showing in the election.
What they're saying: In response to a question from Axios about whether ACA repeal was being considered, Johnson said Republicans were "not even talking about that."
- "We're going to have health care reform because we need to bring down costs, include access and include quality," said Johnson.
- "Every single member of Congress should be committed to those principles. But no one's talking about repealing the ACA. We're talking about improving the existing system. So I've made that very clear."
Flashback: At a campaign event in October, Johnson said in response to a question about the ACA: "No Obamacare. 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."
- He later said he hadn't promised to end the ACA, and stressed the "deeply ingrained" part.
- Trump has also said that he has "concepts of a plan" to replace the ACA, but then also walked back talk of repeal as well.
The bottom line: While Johnson took ACA repeal off the table, he still said unspecified health care reforms could be an option.
