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So much for President Donald Trump’s renewed health-policy push. It was only a week or so ago that his Department of Justice announced it would fully back a lawsuit aimed at repealing the Affordable Care Act, a move Trump brought further attention to by calling Republicans “the party of health care” while promising a superior plan. Now he’s punting, saying this great new plan — which appears to be a version of a previous failed effort — won’t come up for a vote until at least 2021, and only if he wins the election. (Max Nisen, 4/2)

The only plausible explanation for President Trump’s renewed effort through the courts to do away with the Affordable Care Act, other than muscle memory, is a desire to play to his base despite widely reported misgivings in his own administration and among Republicans in Congress. Reality check: But the Republican base has more complicated views about the ACA than the activists who show up at rallies and cheer when the president talks about repealing the law. The polling is clear: Republicans don’t like the ACA, but just like everyone else, they like its benefits and will not want to lose them. (Drew Altman and Mollyann Brodie, 4/3)

Let’s say you’re a 52-year-old bricklayer, and years of physical labor have taken their toll. Or you’re 54 and find yourself laid off. Or maybe you’ve worked really hard your entire career and would like to retire at age 60, volunteer, and spend more time with your grandkids. Wouldn’t it be great if Medicare were an option for you? Soon it could be, under legislation I’ve introduced with Democratic colleagues in the U.S. Senate and House, led by U.S. Rep. Brian Higgins, D-New York, to give people age 50 to 64 the option to buy into Medicare. Passing the Medicare at 50 Act is something we can do right now to expand health care and give people more certainty in a time of great uncertainty. (U.S. Sen. Debbie Stabenow, 4/3)

Nearly a quarter century ago, then Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich said this about the original Medicare program: “We believe it’s going to wither on the vine because we think people are voluntarily going to leave it — voluntarily.” Gingrich argued that original Medicare — based on a 1960s-style fee-for-service benefit package with a confusing set of deductibles, co-insurance, and copays — was stuck in the past. He saw a day when Medicare-contracted private health plans would prove so attractive that Medicare beneficiaries would have to choose them. It’s taken a generation, but Gingrich is on the verge of being right about Medicare. (Michael Adelberg and Kristin Rodriguez, 4/3)

Just last week, President Trump promised that any minute now, Republicans were going to produce a plan to solve all the problems in the health-care system, one that would be, and I quote, “spectacular.” In response, I argued he was putting his party in an uncomfortable position by forcing Republicans to talk about an issue they would much prefer to avoid altogether. Now Trump seems to have realized his mistake. (Paul Waldman, 4/2)

Lawmakers have the opportunity to dramatically improve our health and financial well-being by expanding Medicaid. Nearly a dozen bills are related to Medicaid expansion in the Texas legislature. Earlier this month, Rep. Garnet Coleman's bill (HB 565) to expand Medicaid and protect essential health benefits received a committee hearing, marking the first time the House Committee on Insurance has heard testimony on Medicaid in six years. And Senator Nathan Johnson has introduced a resolution, SJR 34, to put Medicaid expansion on the ballot with support from a diverse consumer coalition, Cover Texas Now. (Hussain Lalani, 4/3)

How to achieve universal health insurance in California? In our super-progressive, supermajority Democratic state, that’s the health policy question of the day. Not if we should lead the way on universal coverage, but how. ...We need to revamp our insurance mess. We can do this with a well-known and proven solution: single-payer. (James G. Kahn, 4/2)