Trump threatens health subsidies
President pushing GOP senators to try again on repeal
WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump on Saturday threatened once more to end required payments to insurance companies unless lawmakers repeal and replace the Obama-era health care law.
In apparent frustration over Friday’s failure by the Senate Republican majority to pass a bill repealing parts of the Affordable Care Act, Trump tweeted: “If a new HealthCare Bill is not approved quickly, BAILOUTS for Insurance Companies and BAILOUTS for Members of Congress will end very soon!”
No Democrats voted for the GOP bill.
Repeal-and-replace has been a guiding star for Republicans ever since President Barack Obama enacted the law in 2010. That goal, which Trump turned into a top campaign promise, remains out of reach even with Republicans controlling the White House and Congress. The issue has dominated the opening months of Trump’s presidency.
But Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., said after the bill failed early Friday that he would move to other legislative business in the upcoming week.
Trump also tweeted: “Unless the Republican Senators are total quitters, Repeal & Replace is not dead! Demand another vote before voting on any other bill!”
The subsidies, totaling about $7 billion a year, help reduce deductibles and copayments for consumers with modest incomes.
The Obama administration used its rule-making authority to set direct payments to insurers to help offset these costs. Trump inherited the payment structure, but he also has the power to end them.
The payments are the subject of a lawsuit brought by House Republicans over whether the Affordable Care Act included a congressional appropriation for the money, as required under the Constitution. Trump has only guaranteed the payments through July, which ends Monday.
Trump previously said the law would collapse immediately whenever those payments stop. He has indicated a desire to halt the subsidies but has allowed them to continue on a month-to-month basis. Without the payments, analysts have said, more insurers might drop out of the system, limiting options for consumers and clearing the way for the insurers who stay to charge more for coverage.
The Senate’s Democratic leader, Chuck Schumer of New York, cautioned such a step, saying it would make health care more expensive.
“If the president refuses to make the cost sharing reduction payments, every expert agrees that premiums will go up and health care will be more expensive for millions of Americans,” Schumer said Saturday. “The president ought to stop playing politics with people’s lives and health care, start leading and finally begin acting presidential.”
Meanwhile, conservatives across the country are warning the GOP-led Congress not to abandon its pledge to repeal Obamacare — or risk a political nightmare in next year’s elections.
The Senate’s failure has outraged the Republican base and triggered a new wave of fear.
“This is an epic fail for Republicans,” said Tim Phillips, president of Americans For Prosperity, the political arm of the conservative Koch Brothers’ network. “Their failure to keep their promise will hurt them. It will.”
To the American Conservative Union, the three GOP senators who blocked the stripped-down repeal bill that failed in the wee hours Friday are “sellouts.”
A Trump-sanctioned super political action committee did not rule out running ads against uncooperative Republicans, which it did recently against Sen. Dean Heller, R-Nev.
There are limited options for directly punishing the renegade senators — Susan Collins of Maine, John McCain of Arizona and Lisa Murkowski of Alaska. None of the three is up for re-election next fall.
McCain, whose “no” vote killed the bill, is serving his last term in office, has brain cancer and is hardly moved by electoral threats.
Still, broad disillusionment among conservative voters could have an impact beyond a few senators. Primary election challenges or a low turnout could mean trouble for all Republicans. Democrats need to flip 24 seats to take control of the House of Representatives, a shift that would reshape the last two years of Trump's first term.
“If you look at competitive districts, swing districts, or districts where Republicans could face primary challenges, this is something that will be a potent electoral issue,” Republican pollster Chris Wilson said of his party's health care failure. “I don't think this is something voters are going to forget.”
Around the country, GOP voters continue to support efforts to repeal Obamacare.
A CNN poll released this month found that 83 percent of Republicans favor some form of repeal, while only 11 percent of Republicans want the party to abandon the repeal effort.
“The political pressure on something like this is real,” said GOP strategist Mike Shields. “I don't think this is over.”
Trump seems content to let the current system collapse. “As I said from the beginning, let ObamaCare implode, then deal. Watch!” he said in a tweet.