McConnell: Uninsured people are 'not the issue'

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) on Sunday pledged to repeal President Barack Obama's health care reforms and said that the 30 million Americans that the law is likely to cover were "not the issue" for Republicans.

During an interview on Fox News, host Chris Wallace asked McConnell how Republicans who were promising to "repeal and replace" the law would make sure those 30 million Americans had access to health insurance.

"The single best thing we could do for the American health care system is to get rid of Obamacare," McConnell explained.

"You talk about repeal and replace, how would you provide universal coverage?" Wallace asked again.

"I'll get to it in a minute," McConnell chuckled. "We need to go step by step to replace it with more moderate reforms that will not be a 2,700-page Republican alternative."

"I just want to ask what specific steps are you going to do to provide universal coverage to the 30 million people who are uninsured?" Wallace pressed.

"That is not the issue," McConnell insisted.

"You don't think the 30 million people who are uninsured is an issue?" Wallace wondered.

"We're not going to turn the American health care system into a Western European system," the Kentucky Republican replied. "They want to have the federal government take over all of American health care."

Watch this video from Fox News' Fox News Sunday, broadcast July 1, 2012.