Northwest Arkansas Democrat-Gazette
Health care overhaul loses another Republican vote
WASHINGTON — The revamped Republican push for a sweeping overhaul of the nation’s health care system ran into a new roadblock Tuesday when a key lawmaker, Rep. Fred Upton, R-Mich., said he would vote against the current proposal.
The White House and House leaders sought holdouts’ support in hopes of pushing the measure through the chamber this week, but they remained short of votes.
In an interview with WHTC radio in Holland, Mich., Upton, a former chairman and current member of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, said he could not support the latest version of the House GOP plan because he does not believe it does enough to protect people with pre-existing medical conditions.
“This amendment torpedoes that, and I told the leadership I cannot support the bill with this provision in it,” said Upton. “I don’t know how it all will play out, but I know there are a good number of us that have raised real red flags.”
Upton told The Associated Press that the bill’s treatment of people with pre-existing illnesses “does not fit” with comments President Donald Trump made in an interview last weekend. Trump said in an interview broadcast on CBS News’ Face the Nation on Sunday that the latest bill would “beautifully” protect those with pre-existing conditions.
“Can there be a fix? Maybe, but it is not part of the equation before us,” Upton said.
Upton’s comments came the day after Rep. Billy Long, R-Mo., a longtime opponent of the 2010 Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, came out against the current Republican plan to repeal and replace key parts of it, also citing concerns about pre-existing conditions.
The growing opposition among influential House Republicans has stoked deep uncertainty about when or even if GOP leaders will hold a vote on a revised measure. The Energy and Commerce Committee that Upton sits on has played a leading role in health care overhaul attempts this year.
Despite White House prodding, House leaders have said a vote will occur only once they can succeed. Republicans left their weekly conference meeting Tuesday with no vote on the schedule.
House GOP leaders stayed quiet Tuesday as they were asked about prospects for a vote. As they left a morning news conference, House Majority Whip Steve Scalise, R-La., was asked about the current vote tally.
“It’s better,” he responded. House Speaker Paul Ryan, R-Wis., said leaders are “making very good progress,” but other Republicans voiced pessimism.
Rep. Chris Collins, R-N.Y., a Trump ally who supports the legislation, said GOP lawmakers were worrying that Democrats could use the pre-existing condition issue for damaging if inaccurate attack ads in next year’s congressional elections.
“In the last 24 hours, things have moved in the negative direction,” Collins said of the bill’s support.
Since last week, 21 Republicans have said they’re against the legislation, according to an Associated Press count. At least 11 others said they are undecided. Those numbers can change with lobbying by the White House, House leaders and industry groups. If no Democrats support the bill, the Republicans could lose no more than 22 GOP votes to pass it in the House.
A senior Trump adviser said the White House counts Republicans as five votes short on the bill, which he said could drop to zero or grow to 15. The official signaled that the White House would blame GOP leaders for falling short, saying, “Let’s see if the hill can deliver.”
“Hopefully we’re just a handful away,” said Rep. Mark Meadows, R-N.C., the chairman of the far-right House Freedom Caucus, who helped put together the alternative bill. “There’s still a lot of undecided, but generally, at this stage of the game, you can address the concerns of the undecideds.”
Ryan said Tuesday that Trump has been “nothing but helpful” on health care. He and Scalise tried to defend the GOP plan against criticism that it would harm Americans with pre-existing conditions.
The current GOP plan would allow insurance providers in some states to deny coverage or charge higher premiums to people with pre-existing conditions or costly health problems, as long as those states set up “high-risk pools” that could help cover the cost of care.
Opponents say it diminishes protections for those with pre-existing conditions by letting insurers charge unaffordable prices. They say high-risk pools have a mixed record because government money financing them often proves inadequate.
“Our bill protects people with pre-existing conditions, and it actually provides multiple layers of protection for people with pre-existing conditions in ways that Obamacare doesn’t do,” said Scalise.
Several reluctant Republicans continued to talk as if the bill could be negotiated. Rep. Elise Stefanik, R-N.Y., a leader of the moderate Tuesday Group who has not taken a position on the bill, told reporters she was “involved in all of the discussions.”
Rep. Steve Pearce, R-N.M., who had joined his Freedom Caucus colleagues to support the bill, said he would have to re-evaluate if some changes were pushed through.
“If they don’t make changes, I’m a yes,” he said. “But they don’t have the votes, so they could change it.”
Rep. Tom MacArthur, R-N.J., a Tuesday Group co-chairman who negotiated the amendment with Meadows, dodged questions about possible further changes. “I’m not in every conversation, so I can’t really say,” he said.
Rep. Rodney Frelinghuysen, R-N.J., the chairman of the Appropriations Committee who opposed the previous version of the bill, which GOP leaders pulled back earlier this year, evaded repeated questions on whether he would vote yes now.
The White House, where aides have suggested a vote is possible today, continued to lobby members Monday even though no vote had been scheduled. Vice President Mike Pence hunkered down in his office on the House side of the Capitol, with undecided and yes-voting members stopping by to talk.
Absent from the House Republican effort to get to 216 votes is much talk about what happens in the Senate. There, Republicans will run up against the Senate parliamentarian, who must rule on whether some provisions are allowable in a budget reconciliation bill — the vehicle they’re using to repeal the health care law to avoid the potential of a filibuster, which would require a 60-vote win and thus Democratic votes.
“If you’re in the House, what you should be thinking now is that if it doesn’t survive, it all comes back to you,” said Sen. Roy Blunt, R-Mo. “I think what they should be focused on is getting the process moving and, frankly, passing the obligation over to the Senate.”