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Obama Expresses Willingness to Back GOP Health Care Law

January 6, 2017

President Obama pledged to publicly support a Republican health care reform law if he believes it would be substantially better than the current Affordable Care Act.

Obama made the remark on Friday afternoon in a live-streamed sit-down interview at the White House with Vox's Ezra Klein and Sarah Kliff about the future of Obamacare.

"I am saying to every Republican right now, if you, in fact, can put a plan together that is demonstrably better than what Obamacare is doing, I will publicly support repealing Obamacare and replacing it with your plan," the outgoing president said.

"But I want to see it first," he added.

President-elect Donald Trump and the Republican-controlled Congress have pledged that repealing and replacing Obamacare will be their top priority in 2017. Vice President-elect Mike Pence visited Capitol Hill this week to meet with congressional leaders, including House Speaker Paul Ryan (R., Wis.) and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R., Ky.), to discuss how Congress can begin the process of repealing Obama's signature health care law.

That same day, President Obama huddled with congressional Democrats to explore how they can fight and oppose efforts to repeal Obamacare. The president has suggested that he will continue to publicly weigh in on plans to reform or change the Affordable Care Act.