President Donald Trump's performance has been "mixed" during his first three months in the White House, U.S. Sen. John Boozman said Wednesday.
The Republican from Rogers said he believes that the Republican-controlled Congress will enact an overhaul of the federal Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act before the 2018 general election.
Boozman said Trump has a "very good" national security team and that "everybody feels very, very good" about U.S. Defense Secretary James Mattis, who is a retired Marine Corps general.
"He's getting his Cabinet in place," Boozman said of Trump. "They are outsiders. I think that is a good thing, looking at government in a different way."
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The senator was interviewed in North Little Rock after he was presented with an award from the National Emergency Management Association.
Boozman said U.S. Supreme Court Justice Neil Gorsuch, whom Trump appointed and Boozman voted to confirm, "is an outstanding individual and an outstanding lawyer, and I think he'll make a great Supreme Court justice."
Asked about Trump's weaknesses, Boozman said, "I think he can do a better job of communicating some things ... all around.
"Part of that is being outsiders in the sense that people aren't familiar with the government, so there are easier ways to get [things] done sometimes and just not realize it," he said. "I think that the president is growing into his job."
Boozman has served in the U.S. Senate since 2011 and was in the U.S. House of Representatives from 2001-11.
He noted that when he ran for Congress, "all of a sudden when I said something it meant something, and when I ran for the Senate, there is even more notice.
"As president of the United States, every word that he says, the whole world is looking. I think he is coming to that realization and moderating his behavior," Boozman said.
About 300,000 low-income Arkansans receive private health insurance coverage through Arkansas' version of Medicaid expansion that's now called Arkansas Works. Republican Gov. Asa Hutchinson plans to seek a waiver from the Trump administration for changes in the program.
The state's Medicaid expansion is financed through provisions of the Affordable Care Act signed into law by President Barack Obama in 2010. Many people refer to the federal law as Obamacare.
Boozman said congressmen have been "trying to reach a compromise on how to go forward" with repealing and replacing the federal health care law, and "the House is struggling to do that." An attempt to change the law earlier this year failed.
"Then, whatever comes out of the House will go to the Senate, and we're just a two-vote majority [in the 100-member Senate] and then trying to please everyone there is going to be difficult also," he said.
"So far, there has been nothing to make it such that we are controlling the affordability and controlling the cost, which is really the key component, so I am a guy that believes that we need to do something because if you visit with almost anybody, most people believe that the path we're on right now is simply not sustainable," he said.
Boozman said only 17 percent of Americans thought that House Republican leaders' attempt at repealing and replacing the federal law earlier this year was a good idea.
"You've got to get a buy-in from Congress and in this go-around I think you can get a buy-in from the American public," he said. "I think there is going to be a lot of sticker shock as we go into the next premium cycle for the next year, so I think events will cause us to have to do something. And at some point, Democrats and Republicans working together can come up with a solution."
Asked whether those on Arkansas' version of Medicaid expansion have reason to worry about the future of their coverage, Boozman said, "I think they have something to worry right now because Aetna and the larger insurers are saying that we are in a death spiral right now."
"We're in a little different situation in Arkansas because of the method that we chose to do it," he said. "People ask me, why don't we do this nationwide? And the problem is the expense." The state is paying 5 percent of the cost of the program now and will pay 10 percent by 2020.
The other problem is that there are many congressmen who don't want to go through insurance companies to purchase private insurance for people covered by Medicaid expansions, he said.
Earlier, Arkansas Department of Emergency Management Director A.J. Gary presented Boozman with a congressional award from the National Emergency Management Association for what Gray described as "recognition of contributions to the emergency management community and commitment to ensuring public safety and security."
The association presented similar awards to Sen. Joe Manchin, D-W.V.; Jeanne Shaheen, D-N.H.; and Rep. Jim Langevin, D-R.I., according to the association, based in Lexington, Ky.
A Section on 04/20/2017
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