Reynolds seeking conversation with Trump on Iowa's 'stopgap' insurance proposal

Iowa Gov. Kim Reynolds said Tuesday she has requested a conversation with President Donald Trump following a news report that he instructed his top human services administrator to deny Iowa's proposal to stabilize its individual insurance market. 

"I haven’t spoken directly to the president," Reynolds told reporters at her weekly news conference. "I’ve asked for a conversation."

The Washington Post reported last week that Trump, upon hearing of Iowa's waiver request, called the administrator overseeing the proposal and told her to reject it. Iowa Insurance Commissioner Doug Ommen has expressed frustration that the proposal has not yet been approved, but he and Reynolds say they have received no indication from the White House that the state's proposal will be rejected.

"We were actually on the phone yesterday, my team was, talking with (Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services Administrator) Seema Verma about the stopgap proposal and where we’re at and what we need to do," Reynolds said Tuesday. "So our indication is they’ve been very receptive. They continue to work with us."

The federal government currently is conducting a 30-day public comment period that ends Oct. 19.

If the plan is approved, the state would have little time to implement the changes before open enrollment is set to begin Nov. 1.

"I think we have a history of being able to deliver," Reynolds said. "We’ve done that before. We’re working in the background making sure that we can execute. As I indicated, this is not an easy process. It just isn’t. There’s a lot of criteria that needs to be met because of the inflexibility that Obamacare requires. And so we have to work through all that."

Ommen proposed the plan, which he calls a "stopgap" approach, in June amid concerns that no insurers would offer individual health insurance in Iowa for 2018. One carrier, Medica, later announced it will sell individual insurance policies in Iowa next year, but it will require steep premium increases. 

Those affected are the 72,000 Iowans who buy their own health insurance rather than obtaining it through an employer or government program such as Medicaid or Medicare. 

Many of those people qualify for subsidies through the Affordable Care Act which ease their financial burden. But about 28,000 Iowans make too much money to qualify and would have to shoulder the entire cost of their coverage. 

An analysis released in August predicted those increased premiums would cause between 21,000 and 26,000 Iowans to drop their coverage.

Ommen's plan would redirect Affordable Care Act money in a way that he says would encourage more young, healthy Iowans to buy individual insurance policies and ease risks to insurance carriers.

The August report found that if the federal government were to approve the proposal, far fewer — about 4,000 to 6,000 Iowans — would drop their coverage.

But others contend the proposal would dramatically increase costs for moderate-income Iowans, possibly drawing a lawsuit. 

Reynolds brushed off concerns about a lawsuit, saying people often disagree with public policy. 

But she expressed continued frustration with Congress, which has now failed to pass legislation repealing and replacing the Affordable Care Act on two separate occasions. 

"It’s ultimately up to them to fix this for the long term," she said. "And I’m really disappointed that they haven’t gotten that done. But in the meantime we have to do something, and states all across this nation have to do something, and that’s what we’re working on."