On Tuesday’s broadcast of “CNN Newsroom,” Representative Mo Brooks (R-AL) argued that “the best thing that we can do in the federal government to ensure that people can afford healthcare, is to do things that will help increase wages, and one of the best things we can do to help increase wages for working Americans is to deport the illegal aliens that have flooded the marketplace, suppressing wages for all Americans,” and increase border security.

Brooks said that the replacement plan is “still the largest welfare program ever proposed by the Republican Party.” He further stated that the CBO’s score on the deficit impact of the plan is based on “static” estimates, but that political dynamics will lead Congress to increase the subsidies for health insurance.

He later added, “I would like to see people voluntarily purchase health insurance, in order to minimize their risk of a significant loss because of illness, but this is America. We believe in liberty, and we believe in freedom. And if you’re going to believe in liberty and freedom, then you cannot, with the heavy boot of the federal government, force people to purchase insurance.”

Brooks further stated, “If you want to get into the affording aspect of it, the best thing that we can do in the federal government to ensure that people can afford healthcare, is to do things that will help increase wages, and one of the best things we can do to help increase wages for working Americans is to deport the illegal aliens that have flooded the marketplace, suppressing wages for all Americans, and, in addition to that, those illegal aliens have taken job opportunities from American citizens. Roughly 10 million to 15 million job opportunities that have been lost to Americans.”

He concluded, “Those employers, if they want to hire Americans, they’d have to pay more, and that’s a good thing. But with suppressed wages, a lot of Americans won’t do that work. the illegal aliens will. you take the illegal aliens out of the picture, that work has to get done. That’s why the income goes up, because the employers have to pay whatever the market demands to get Americans to do that work, and that’s good for struggling American families.”

(h/t Mediaite)

Follow Ian Hanchett on Twitter @IanHanchett