Mitt Romney, the former governor of Massachusetts who failed to unseat Barack Obama in the 2012 election, has a unique perspective for criticism of Obamacare — his administration implemented a model closely matching the ACA in that state in 2006.
Romney’s plan worked well for Massachusetts, with 98 to 99 percent of state residents insured just a few years after the health care reforms went into effect.
After Massachusetts became a pilot program for what would be known as Obamacare at a federal level later, the plan worked even better than had been expected — and Secretary of Health and Human Services JudyAnn Bigby said:
“Massachusetts’ achievements in health care reform have been nothing short of extraordinary. With employers, government and individuals all sharing the responsibility of reform, we continue to have the highest insurance rate in the nation.”
In 2011, the Boston Globe reviewed the reform known as Romneycare, and commented that Mitt Romney’s health care legacy “[had], after five years, worked as well as or better than expected.”
But in 2013 as Obamacare rolls out, Mitt Romney is not so certain his administration’s plan will be successful on a federal level or as applied to all states.
While there may be a degree of frustration at the opponent who defeated him so valiantly sticking to the plan Romney himself first created, the former Massachusetts governor believes that as a federal plan, Romneycare may not fit the whole of the United States.
In a Facebook post published to his more than 11 million fans, Romney said:
“In the years since the Massachusetts health care law went into effect nothing has changed my view that a plan crafted to fit the unique circumstances of a single state should not be grafted onto the entire country. Beyond that, had President Obama actually learned the lessons of Massachusetts health care, millions of Americans would not lose the insurance they were promised they could keep, millions more would not see their premiums skyrocket, and the installation of the program would not have been a frustrating embarrassment.”
The former GOP candidate concludes:
“Health reform is best crafted by states with bipartisan support and input from its employers, as we did, without raising taxes, and by carefully phasing it in to avoid the type of disruptions we are seeing nationally.”
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Mitt Romney ‘s Obamacare post is unusual for the Republican, as he both updates Facebook infrequently, as well as tends to shy away from overtly political content following his 2012 loss to President Barack Obama.