President Barack Obama's press conference Friday in which he spoke of the botched rollout of the Affordable Care Act was a dismal way for the White House to close out the year, former Rep. Pete Hoekstra of Michigan says.
"The president was on the defensive most of this press conference. It was not a great way to close out a year and there were just all kinds of inconsistencies," Hoekstra told "The Steve Malzberg Show" on Newsmax TV.
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At the press conference, the president said while the flawed rollout was his biggest mistake of the year, the healthcare law — which he has had to repeatedly tweak — is now working and that millions will now have affordable healthcare coverage.
"They are doing modifications of this law each and every day and the sad thing here is the president says, wow, we've had 1 million people sign up in the last three months," Hoekstra said.
"It's kind of like, well that's 1 million of the five million who've had their policies canceled, which means that 4 million people are still hanging out there.
You've got 3.9 million people who have gone onto Medicaid, which a lot of doctors and hospitals won't take because Medicaid reimbursements are absolutely miserable."
Hoekstra, former chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, said Obama's claim that health costs are stabilizing is "not the concern that people have right now.
"You've got all of these people who can't get through the website, who can't sign up, who don't know whether they're going to have care or not."
He also said the question of whether it is safe to register online without fear of cyber thieves stealing personal information is up in the air.
"As [Rep.]Mike Rogers from Michigan has been saying for the last couple of months, there's not the security in Obamacare to protect people's personal data," Hoekstra said.
"And we haven't even gotten to the point yet where someone walks into a doctor's office, [and will they have the documentation? Will the doctor get paid? Will the doctor take the patient?
"This thing is poised to fail and fail miserably. The president was on the defensive most of this press conference."
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