Trump tweaks GOP on keeping health care vow
Senate’s McConnell plans critical vote on plan for Tuesday.
A peeved President Donald Trump browbeat Republican opponents of his party’s reeling health care bill Monday, asserting that his predecessor’s signature overhaul has meant “death” and saying the Senate’s planned faceoff vote is their chance to keep their pledge to repeal it.
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell said he’d call a vote Tuesday on begin- ning debate on the legislation. While a victory on that initial but crucial roll call seemed an uphill climb, some Republicans expressed a new opti- mism that it would prevail — though the measure’s ulti- mate fate still seemed gloomy.
McConnell, R-Ky., said he’s “made a commitment to the people I represent” to undo President Barack Obama’s health care overhaul, in what seemed a pointed reminder to Republican senators that they’ve made the same vow.
McConnell did not describe precisely what version of the GOP legislation senators would be voting on, though No. 2 House GOP leader John Cornyn of Texas said later that Republicans would discuss that at a private lunch before the vote. That omission has caused confusion and frustration among some Republican senators.
At the White House, Trump lambasted Dem- ocrats who helped enact the 2010 health care law and uniformly oppose the GOP attempt to scrap and rewrite it.
“They run out and say, ‘Death, death, death,’” Trump said, with a back- drop of families that he said have encountered problems getting affordable, reliable medical coverage because of Obama’s statute. “Well, Obamacare is death. That’s the one that’s death.”
Some Democrats have said the GOP repeal effort would lead to death for patients who lose coverage. The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office has said various versions of the legislation would mean more than 20 million Americans would become uninsured by 2026.
But Trump focused many of his remarks on GOP sena- tors. McConnell is nursing a slim 52-48 majority and the possible absence of Arizona Sen. John McCain, who’s battling cancer, which would mean two GOP defections would sink the measure.
“For Senate Republicans, this is their chance to keep their promise. Over and over again, they said, ‘Repeal and replace, repeal and replace.’ But they can now keep their promise,” Trump said.
At least a dozen Republican senators have publicly opposed or criticized the legislation, more than enough to kill it. That’s forced McConnell to step back twice from anticipated votes and to revise his bill in hopes of mollifying unhappy moderates and conservatives.
In comments highlighting GOP tensions, Rep. Blake Farenthold, R-Texas, said it is “absolutely repugnant” that Republican senators aren’t following through on campaign promises to repeal Obama’s law.
Without naming them, he mentioned “female senators from the Northeast” and said, “If it was a guy from South Texas, I might ask him to step outside and settle this Aaron Burr style,” a reference to the firearms duel in which Burr killed Alexander Hamilton.