Treasury Secretary Jack Lew did his best to spin the underwhelming launch of the Obamacare-exchange websites on Fox News Sunday, declining to say how many people signed up for health-care plans.
“We saw 7 million people rush to go onto the webpage to find out — what are their choices in this new marketplace to buy affordable health care?” he said. “They have six months to sign up. This is a big decision.”
When host Chris Wallace asked Lew what Americans should make of the website’s unimpressive launch, Lew shrugged it off by noting that major software companies often update their products. And despite repeated questioning from Wallace, Lew refused to say how many Americans have signed up for plans in the exchanges: “I don’t have the exact number, but . . . it’s the wrong question,” Lew said.
Wallace wondered if it was because Lew didn’t know the actual number, which the Obama administration has failed to reveal, or whether that number was “embarrassingly small,” but Lew continued to punt.
“The fact that so many millions of people rushed to get information is a very good sign,” he said. “That shows how much interest there is in getting health care.”
Media outlets have struggled to find people who have actually enrolled in the federally run exchanges.