D.C. officials vow to fight for uninsured if Obamacare repeal passes

D.C. officials have vowed not to leave the city's most vulnerable residents without health insurance if Congress repeals the Affordable Care Act, despite the possibility of a $623 million shortfall for health care in the District. As the chairman of the D.C. Council's newly formed Health Committee, Vincent Gray is uniquely positioned to take the lead in dealing with the aftermath of a dismantled ACA in the District.

Ap Fact Check: Despite woes Obamacare not in ‘death spiral’

As congressional Republicans prepare to repeal the health law, they are working to portray it as a mess of Democrats' making, and themselves as the ones who will clean up that mess. In the process they are exaggerating the law's very real problems, according to health care experts, who largely believe that the Affordable Care Act's troubles with high prices and lack of competition could be addressed with bipartisan solutions.

Obama presses Trump not to back away from clean energy

WASHINGTON >> President Barack Obama cast the adoption of clean energy in the U.S. as “irreversible,” putting pressure Monday on President-elect Donald Trump not to back away from a core strategy to fight climate change. Obama, penning an opinion article in the journal Science, sought to frame the argument in a way that might appeal to the president-elect: in economic terms.

America has just installed a democratically illegitimate democracy

Donald Trump has won the presidency after narrowly carrying a few states to put him above 270 electoral votes.But according... As the Senate and House of Representatives begin a new session, it's worth noting the fact that America was never a democracy at its founding, and is not a democracy now. House Speaker Paul Ryan has been talking about a peaceful transfer of power.

Vermont Senate Leader Uncertainty abounding in Trump era

A top Vermont lawmaker says getting down to crafting the state's budget and priorities will be difficult without knowing how the policies of the incoming Trump administration will affect decisions on Medicaid, cleaning up Lake Champlain, and a variety of other issues. Legislators are prepared to work with the office of Republican Gov. Phil Scott, the congressional delegation and other states, controlled by both Republicans and Democrats, to find common ground, said Senate President Pro Tem Tim Ashe, a Democrat-Progressive from Burlington.

McConnell says Senate will act this week on Obamacare repeal, ‘rapid’ replacement

The U.S. Senate will take its first steps toward repealing President Barack Obama's signature health care reform act by the end of the week, Republican Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell said on Sunday. Speaking on CBS's "Face the Nation," McConnell said: "There ought not to be a great gap" between repealing the act and replacing it and that Republicans would be "replacing it rapidly after repealing it."

The top-10 issues facing Colorado lawmakers in the 2017 session

The 2016 election returned a split legislature that will face the same questions this year with the addition of a new complication - a new Donald Trump administration promising big changes. Republican and Democratic legislative leaders are easing toward agreements to earmark money for road construction and overhaul legal remedies for construction defects, but significant details remain unresolved.

New Legislative Session Brings $500 Million Deficit, Uncertainty

New Legislative Session Brings $500 Million Deficit, Uncertainty With one eye on a $500 million state budget gap and the other on Washington, Gov. John Hickenlooper and a split Colorado Legislature enter the 2017 lawmaking session with little expectation of fiscal reform and plenty of uncertainty over transportation, the state's Medicaid bills, affordable housing and illegal pot sales. Jury Convicts Man Accused Of Concealing Victim In A Barrel A Nebraska man accused of killing another man and hiding his body in a barrel has been found guilty of first-degree murder.

Rep. Black: Obamacare Repeal Will Include Transition Period

While Republicans are working to repeal Obamacare, there will still be a stable transition period so "no one has the rug pulled out from underneath them" Rep. Diane Black said in Saturday's GOP address . "Our goal is a system that lowers costs, and spurs free market competition, and ultimately empowers you, not bureaucrats in Washington," the Tennessee Republican said in the weekly statement, decrying Democrats in Washington using "all kinds of scare tactics" in order to keep the healthcare law.

Trump and Schumer: From potential allies to antagonists

In this May 12, 2016, file photo Sen. Charles Schumer, D-N.Y., looks from behind a poster of then-Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump, while he speaks with reporters about Trump, on Capitol Hill in Washington. In the weeks after November's election, President-elect Trump and incoming Senate Democratic Leader Schumer sounded like potential allies.

Concerns over dumping Obamacare growing among GOP lawmakers

Republicans are increasingly jittery over rushing to demolish much of President Barack Obama's health care law without having a GOP alternative that's ready to go. While nothing about revamping the nation's $3 trillion-a-year health care system will be easy, Republican leaders want congressional committees to have legislation dismantling much of Obama's overhaul ready by late January.

Fitzhugh Touts Rural Credentials As He Mulls Governor’s Bid

State House Minority Leader Craig Fitzhugh is seriously considering joining the race to succeed term-limited Tennessee Gov. Bill Haslam in 2018. The Ripley Democrat told reporters this week that he would have appeal for voters from both urban and rural areas of the state.

NC governor formally begins Medicaid expansion pursuit

North Carolina's new Democratic governor has formally started his effort to expand Medicaid to more of the working poor in the state, even as Republicans in Washington bear down on repealing the federal health care law that offers this increased coverage. Cooper's office said he sent a letter to federal regulators Friday.

Obama to GOP: I will support Obamacare repeal if you produce a better plan

President Obama vowed to publicly support congressional Republicans' plan to repeal his signature health care law if they put forward an alternative proposal that can prove it covers as many people for less money. "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," Obama said in an interview with Vox .

Obama derides a recklessa plan to repeal now, replace later

President Barack Obama derided as "reckless" on Friday a Republican plan to repeal his health care law now and replace it later, predicting that the replacement may never come. In an opinion piece in the New England Journal of Medicine, Obama sought to dispel the notion that Republicans could fulfill their campaign promises to gut the Affordable Care Act immediately without risking devastating consequences for consumers.

Federal judge blocks Obamacare’s protections for transgender patients

Three weeks before President Barack Obama leaves office, a federal judge dealt yet another blow to the president's signature policy, siding with religiously affiliated health care providers over the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. U.S. District Judge Reed O'Connor on Dec. 31 blocked the Affordable Care Act's so-called transgender mandate, which sought to end discrimination on the basis of gender identity within the health care system.

White House Announces Release of Final Update to the Coordinated…

On January 4, 2016, the White House announced the release of the 2017 Update to the Coordinated Framework for the Regulation of Biotechnology . The Update to the Coordinated Framework provides a comprehensive summary of the roles and responsibilities of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency , the U.S. Food and Drug Administration , and the U.S. Department of Agriculture with respect to regulating biotechnology products.