Back when a presidential campaign was most definitely twinkling in Marco Rubio's eye, when he was speaker of the Florida House, he thought he had the solution to healthcare reform—a no-mandate, market-based exchange. Introduced and passed in 2008, and after spending $2.4 million Florida Health Choices finally opened last year, and has
signed up 80 people. (80, not 80K).
“It’s about competition, it’s about choice, and it’s about the marketplace,” he told The Palm Beach Post at the time.
Florida Health Choices, which finally opened last year, now covers 80 people.
Obamacare, which Rubio wants to repeal, covers 1.6 million in Florida alone. And 93 percent of them are subsidized.
Rubio actually doesn't talk about his plan that much, leaving it out of the discussion when he talks about repeal and replace. But his spokesperson, Brooke Sammon, had an answer for why her boss's plan was less than successful—it was all Obamacare's fault. "It is unfortunate that this disastrous healthcare law is impacting the Florida Health Choices program, which is exactly the kind of consumer-based healthcare solution Americans are looking for." Yes, all 80 of them.
But here's one thing Rubio might have accomplished for his state: if the Supreme Court rules in the King v. Burwell case that subsidies should not be available to people who get insurance on the federal exchange, Florida Health Choices potentially could be there to step in as the state-based exchange.