March 26, 2015 06:30 AM UTC

Gardner promise: Obamacare replacement will be "ready to go"

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• by: Jason Salzman

(Promoted by Colorado Pols)

The Hill’s Sarah Ferris reported today that Obama is mocking Republicans for claiming to have an alternative to Obamacare, when they obviously don’t.

Five years after the passage of his signature healthcare law, President Obama took a jab at the Republican Party for still lacking its own plan to replace it.

“We have been promised a lot of things these past five years that didn’t turn out to be the case,” Obama said at a White House event marking the healthcare law’s progress. “Death panels. Doom. A serious alternative from Republicans in Congress.”

Colorado’s Sen. Cory Gardner is one of the Republicans whom Obama is mocking. Asked if Republicans would have a plan ready if the Supreme Court rules against the health care law in King v. Burwell, Gaardner said on Fox News Wednesday (at 2:30):

“I think the Republicans not only will have a plan but something the President will accept, because it’s something we have to do,” said Gardner, citing the efforts of GOP Senators John Barrasso of Wyoming, Louisiana’s Bill Cassidy, and Nebraska’s Benjamin Sass.

“Republican’s will have a plan in place if the ruling is for the plaintiffs. Our plan will be ready to go,” Gardner said.

The replacement will be ready to go? If that’s true, why has it taken so long? And why wait for the Supreme Court’s decision? Gardner has been voting for the repeal Obamacare for years.

He even advocated for the government shutdown, in an effort to defund the health care program.

So Reporters should hold Gardner to his latest Obamacare-replacement promise, even if the justices uphold the health-care law. It will be ready do go, Gardner promised, so I’d think reporters would be looking forward to seeing it, one way or the other.