Opposition to health bill grows
Sponsors say they’ll press ahead, despite dwindling support.
— Republican WASHINGTON opposition to the GOP health care bill swelled to near-fatal numbers Sunday as Sen. Susan Collins all but closed the door on supporting the last-ditch effort to scrap the Obama health care law and Sen. Ted Cruz said that “right now” he doesn’t back it.
White House legislative liaison Marc Short and Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., one of the measure’s sponsors, said Republicans would press ahead with a vote this week. But the comments by Collins and Cruz left the Republican drive to uproot President Barack Obama’s Affordable Care Act dangling by an increasingly slender thread.
A showdown must occur this week for Republicans to prevail with their narrow Senate majority. Next Sunday, protections expire against a Democratic filibuster, bill-killing delays that Republicans lack the votes to overcome. Already two GOP senators,
Rand Paul of Kentucky and John McCain of Arizona, have said they oppose the legislation. All Democrats will vote against it. “No” votes from
three of the 52 GOP senators would kill the party’s effort to deliver on its perennial vow to repeal “Obamacare” and would reprise the party’s politically jarring fail- ure to accomplish that this summer.
Collins cited the bill’s cuts in the Medicaid program for low-income people and the likelihood that it would result in many losing health coverage and paying higher premiums. The Maine moderate also criticized a provision letting states make it easier for
insurers to raise premiums on people with pre-existing medical conditions.
“It’s very difficult for me to envision a scenario where I would end up voting for this bill,” said Collins.
The conservative Cruz also voiced opposition, underscoring the bill’s problems with both ends of the GOP spectrum.
“Right now, they don’t have my vote,” Cruz said at a festival in Austin, Texas. He suggested the measure
doesn’t do enough to reduce premiums by allowing insurers to sell less comprehensive coverage than Obama’s law allows.
Cruz said he doesn’t think fellow conservative Sen. Mike Lee, R-Utah, backs the GOP bill. Lee spokesman Conn Carroll said Lee wants “technical changes” but hasn’t finalized his position.
The growing opposition leaves the White House and party leaders desperate to rescue their promise to repeal Obama’s law with one immediate option: changing opponents’ minds.
Republicans have said they’re still reshaping the bill in hopes of winning over skeptics. Collins said sponsors were making last-minute adjustments in the measure’s formulas for distributing federal money to states.
“So yes, we’re moving forward and we’ll see what happens next week,” Gra
ham said. Paul said even though the bill transforms federal health care dollars into block grants states would control, the GOP bill left too much of that spending intact.
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., has said he intends to have a vote this week but has stopped short of firmly committing to it. The White House’s Short said he expects a vote Wednesday.