Ron Wyden Cliff Owen AP.JPG

Sen. Ron Wyden

(The Associated Press)

Just a few weeks ago, President Donald Trump and congressional Republicans decided to walk away from their promise to "repeal and replace" Obamacare. Or so it seemed.

Negotiations over a replacement bill quietly continued, and now, with the conservative Freedom Caucus in the House apparently on board, revised legislation is advancing. This new bill would allow states to opt out of various benefits the Affordable Care Act considered "essential" and give insurers the option to charge higher premiums for people with preexisting conditions.

"You've got to remember," House Speaker Paul Ryan said this week, "Obamacare is collapsing, and people are getting hit with double-digit premium increases."

(Various fact-checkers have taken issue with this GOP talking point, with the Los Angeles Times calling it "a major exaggeration.")

What do Democrats have to say about the revived repeal-and-replace legislation? Here are two of Oregon's leading members of the party:

"Republicans are back at it again, attempting to revive their efforts to take away health care from millions of Americans," veteran Congressman Earl Blumenauer says in a press release. "They are floating an amended version of their failed health-care bill that would allow states to take away essential health benefits -- such as maternity care, preventative care, or emergency room coverage -- as well as discriminate against Americans with preexisting conditions. This is outrageous. Why buy insurance if it doesn't actually cover anything?"

He continues:

"They are making their bill even worse to get the extremist Tea Party [Freedom Caucus] on board. This amendment does nothing to address the fact that the original Republican legislation STILL includes dismantling Medicaid, provides a massive tax cut to millionaires and billionaires, and will eliminate coverage for an estimated 24 million Americans or more. It remains to be seen what Republicans will accomplish this time around. What is clear is that these changes make an already terrible bill much worse."

Oregon's senior U.S. senator, Ron Wyden, had a similar reaction.

"Set the recent politics aside, and it's absolutely baffling why anybody would vote for a bill this morally reprehensible and dangerous to Americans' health care," Wyden said in a statement. "Make no mistake: there is nothing in Trumpcare that would make people with pre-existing conditions better off. This is discrimination: they would be charged more, necessary services wouldn't be covered, and insurance companies could once again leave people out in the cold. It would shred the health care safety net while handing a massive tax cut to the wealthy and corporations."

He adds:

"It's as if the Trump administration and House Republicans looked at what Americans want in the health care system and wrote a bill that does the opposite. Bottom line, this bill doesn't have a prayer in the Senate. It doesn't warrant 10 minutes of debate, much less a vote."

Republicans in the House caught flak this week for including a provision that exempted members of Congress and their staff from the bill's changes to preexisting-conditions coverage and other potential lost benefits. Party leaders are planning to excise that exemption from the final bill.

-- Douglas Perry