Elective Surgery: Obamacare’s 15th Anniversary, Federal Healthcare Reform, and California’s Medi-Cal Woes

Once a policy lightning rod that ended political careers, the Affordable Care Act (aka, “Obamacare”) has proven to be remarkably resilient with last month marking the 15th anniversary of its being signed into law. Lanhee Chen, the Hoover Institution’s David and Diane Steffy Fellow in American Public Policy Studies and co-chair of Hoover’s Healthcare Policy Working Group, explains how the ACA managed to survive despite power shifts in Washington, what areas of healthcare Congress should address in 2025, and California’s inability to cover the cost of its Medi-Cal program (the state equivalent of Medicaid) due to rising demand among seniors and undocumented residents.   Recorded on April 3, 2025. RELATED SOURCES Fifteen Years Later: The ACA Has an HSA Problem by Lanhee J. Chen Tom Church Daniel L. Heil