If GOP health care bill fails, repeal Obamacare now, replace later

Melina Mara  The Washington Post
Melina Mara The Washington Post
Author

03 July, 2017

But Short maintained that Trump continues to believe that repeal-only legislation should also be considered.

The group, which includes Georgia's David Perdue, Montana's Steve Daines, Iowa's Joni Ernst, Louisiana's John Kennedy, Oklahoma's James Lankford, Utah's Mike Lee, South Dakota's Mike Rounds, Alabama's Luther Strange, Alaska's Dan Sullivan and North Carolina's Thom Tillis wrote Majority Leader Mitch McConnell Friday about the need to focus on five priorities: fixing health care, funding the government, dealing with the debt ceiling, passing a budget resolution, and improving the tax code.

"If you cut $750 billion out of Medicaid, and in the out years you basically starve the program, we have to choose between children, seniors, the disabled, the addicted, the mentally ill", Kasich told ABC News host Martha Raddatz. But he added: "If the replacement part is too hard for Republicans to get together, then let's go back and take care of the first step of repeal".

"That's an option", Short emphasized.

Senate Republicans cautioned Thursday not to expect a final agreement on health care reform bill by Friday, despite a push by GOP leaders and the White House to get by then a framework of a deal that can pass the chamber. Just three GOP defections would doom the legislation, because Democrats are united in opposition.

"It's not easy making America great again, is it?" McConnell said late Friday.

The idea isn't without supporters in the Senate. Texas' Sen. Ted Cruz is pushing a conservative version that aims to aggressively reduce costs by giving states greater flexibility to create separate higher-risk pools.

A group of Republican senators are requesting August recess be canceled or shortened to give the party more time to make progress on its legislative agenda. "Let's keep our word to repeal then work on replacing right away".

While promising to repeal and replace Obamacare over the last seven years, Republicans began to adopt the unsafe metrics and mindset of the Democratic party. Ben Sasse, R-Neb., have been urging McConnell to consider a repeal-only bill first.

"We still got a long way to go I think". Presumably, this is why AP is reporting that the Senate Majority Leader is committed to staying the course: "McConnell says the current health care bill remains challenging but 'we are going to stick with that path'". Capito announced her refusal to support BCRA in a joint statement with Senator Rob Portman, who has also discovered several concerns that failed to cost him any sleep when he voted for H.R. 3762.

"The bill is just being lit up like a Christmas tree full of billion-dollar ornaments, and it's not repeal", Paul said. Republicans hold a 52-seat majority. They were aimed largely at high earners and the medical industry and helped finance his expansion of coverage to about 20 million people.

But at least nine GOP senators expressed opposition after a CBO analysis last week found that McConnell's draft bill would result in 22 million people losing insurance over the next decade, only 1 million fewer than under the House-passed legislation that Trump privately told senators was "mean". "I'm sitting there with a Rubix cube, trying to figure out how to twist the dials to get to 50 to replace this with something better than this", the Kentucky Republican said at the Hardin County GOP's Lincoln Day Dinner, referring to the number of senators needed to pass a bill to overhaul the Affordable Care Act, President Barack Obama's signature health care law. "We could have a big surprise with a great healthcare package".

Which brings us to their purported reasons for failing to support BCRA. We should do repeal with a delay -- let's be clear, I don't want to see anybody thrown off the coverage they have now.

Short and Paul appeared on "Fox News Sunday", Price was on NBC's "Meet the Press", and Sasse spoke on CNN's "State of the Union".


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