Guthrie pressed for answers
The session revved into high gear moments after people began filing into the conference room, and a semi-circle quickly formed of people who often talked over Guthrie's answers and each other.
While Guthrie has held meetings in
"I've been asking for some some kind of town hall since January or (earlier)," said
The topic that dominated the session was health care, with people voicing opposition to efforts made by the
"Why doesn't
"I'm on Obamacare," Guthrie said. "I'm on the (
Changes need to be made to the ACA to encourage younger people to buy health insurance, Guthrie said. One of those changes would be eliminating some "essential" procedures that insurance companies are now mandated to cover. By forcing young people to buy health insurance plans they don't need to help subsidize the cost of insurance for older Americans, "you're transferring wealth from people in their 20s and 30s to people in their 60s," he said.
Guthrie described such a plan as "an age tax."
The
Guthrie agreed that bipartisanship would be the only way to make changes to the ACA. After the session, Guthrie said bipartisanship might be difficult for legislators on the left, because their supporters are advocating for a single-payer health insurance system.
"I think there's a lot of pressure (on) my friends on the left," Guthrie said. "If you fix the ACA, that takes away pressure (to move on) single-payer."
Not everyone at the forum was in favor of retaining the ACA.
"I want to make sure they are doing something to repeal and replace it with good market insurance," Estep said. The bill was demonstrably failing, because some insurance companies have abandoned the insurance exchanges, he said.
"It's a monopoly" in some communities, Estep said.
"I am convinced
Guthrie said a concern was that some of Mueller's attorneys assisting in the investigation had contributed to
Guthrie said "there has really been no evidence of collusion" between the Trump campaign and
Powell said later he was disappointed with Guthrie's position on Mueller. "I would have liked him to be more adamant," Powell said. "I realize he's one man and can't control
"There's a good deal of suspicion" about collusion, Powell said. "I'm not saying (Trump) is guilty, but we need some answers, and I want to hear more forcefully we're going to get the answers. I want (Guthrie) to pound his fist on the table and say, 'Dammit, we are going to get to the bottom of this,' and he didn't do that."
Guthrie stayed over the session's scheduled end time, answering questions.
"I knew going in people are very anxious about what's going on in the health care bill," Guthrie said afterward. "What I see from the inside is the exchanges are collapsing ... We have to fix the ACA. Now that the
If
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