Price: This is ‘absolutely not’ ObamaCare lite

Health and Human Services Secretary Tom Price in an interview broadcast Sunday pushed back against characterizing the GOP’s healthcare replacement plan as ObamaCare lite.

Host Chuck Todd on NBC News’s “Meet the Press” questioned how Price would respond to those referring to the plan as ObamaCare lite, and saying they are “essentially accepting the architecture but just trying to remodel the building.”

“No, absolutely not,” Price said.

Price called the response to the GOP’s healthcare plan a “little puzzling.”

{mosads}”Because independents and conservatives for decades have said, ‘Shouldn’t we equalize the tax treatment of the purchase of health coverage for folks who get it through their employer and folks who aren’t able to get it through their employer?'” he said.

“And that’s exactly what the tax credits do. We don’t dictate to people what they ought to buy or what they must buy.”

Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) said last week the current GOP ObamaCare replacement plan will never satisfy conservatives like himself.

“Conservatives across the land do not like Paul Ryan’s proposal because it is ObamaCare lite,” Paul said on “The O’Reilly Factor.” “We don’t like it.”

“It keeps the subsidies, keeps the taxes, keeps the mandate and actually has an insurance company bailout in it,” he added. “We never have liked it, ObamaCare is a disaster … But the only thing that’s really united us over time is repeal. And if ObamaCare lite is the replacement, conservatives aren’t going to accept it.”