Scott meets with Trump about Obamacare repeal

Gov. Rick Scott's 2010 campaign promise to fight to repeal the Affordable Care Act stalled during the President Barack Obama years, especially after the U.S. Supreme Court upheld the law in 2015.

With the election of Republican Donald Trump, Scott is now getting a lot help on this promise from a friend.

Trump has also promised to repeal and replace Obamacare, the status of which is In the Works.

Repealing the law in Florida would affect a lot of people.

About 1.7 million Floridians signed up for 2017 plans through the federal health care marketplace — more than any other state.

On his first day in office, Trump signed an executive order that gave federal agencies broad authority to defer or delay any part of the Affordable Care Act that costs anybody any money.

Republicans in Congress released a plan March 6 that would scrap major components of the bill, including the expansion of Medicaid in some states, federal subsidies for those who buy insurance and the mandates to require coverage. The GOP plan would create tax credits ranging from $2,000 to $14,000 depending upon consumers' ages. The bill could face an uphill battle in the Senate where some members objected to portions of an earlier draft.

Scott spokeswoman Lauren Schenone told us that "flexibility" for states is Scott's priority for a future health care law.

Scott included some of his ideas in a Jan. 6 letter to House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy. Scott called for getting rid of the individual and employer mandates, a potential tax cut to people above the poverty line, and allowing Florida to run its own Medicaid program. (Scott has flip-flopped on whether Florida should expand Medicaid -- something the Republican-led state Legislature has rejected.)

Scott told reporters in January that he has been talking with Trump every week or two and is working with former Georgia Rep. Tom Price, now Trump's secretary of Health and Human Services.

"I've spent quite a bit of time already with Congressman Price, who I've known for a long time, to try to come up with a plan to repeal what doesn't work and to replace it with something that's going to drive down costs and improve access," Scott told reporters in Washington on Jan. 18, without mentioning specifics.

Before he ran for office, Scott spent $5 million to form Conservatives for Patients' Rights, a group that fought Obama's original health care proposal.

As a candidate in 2010, Scott said he would work to gut the law by supporting a constitutional amendment that would prevent the federal government from enforcing the individual mandate.

The more likely path now appears to be a GOP bill to create a new health care law.

Because this pledge is showing more promise, we rate it In the Works.