GOP leaders plan health vote for next week

Republicans face uphill climb to convince senators on the fence

Washington — Republican leaders pushed toward a Senate vote next Tuesday on resurrecting their nearly flat-lined health care bill. Their uphill drive was further complicated by the ailing GOP Sen. John McCain’s potential absence and a dreary report envisioning that the number of uninsured Americans would soar.

The White House and GOP leaders fished Thursday for ways to win over recalcitrant senators, including an administration proposal to let states use Medicaid funds to help people buy their own private health insurance. But there were no indications they’d ensured the votes needed to even start debating the party’s legislative keystone, a bill scuttling and supplanting President Barack Obama’s health care law.

“Dealing with this issue is what’s right for the country,” said Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky. He added, “It was certainly never going to be easy, but we’ve come a long way and I look forward to continuing our work together to finally bring relief.”

As leaders tested revisions that might attract GOP votes, others began comparing the process with the trade-offs they scorned seven years ago as top Democrats pushed Obama’s overhaul.

“It’s almost becoming a bidding process — let’s throw $50 billion here, let’s throw $100 billion there,” said Sen. Bob Corker, R-Tenn. “It’s making me uncomfortable right now. It’s beginning to feel a lot like how Obamacare came together.”

In a blow, the Congressional Budget Office said McConnell’s latest bill would produce 22 million additional uninsured people by 2026 and drive up premiums for many older Americans. Congress’ nonpartisan fiscal analyst also said it would boost typical deductibles — the money people must pay before insurers cover costs — for single people to $13,000 that year, well above the $5,000 they’d be expected to pay under Obama’s statute.

“Many people with low income would not purchase any plan even if it had very low premiums” because of that exorbitant deductible, the budget office said.

That dire outlook resembled one the office released last month on McConnell’s initial bill, which the leader had to withdraw as Republicans rebelled against it.

Thursday’s report seemed unlikely to do much better to help win over balking moderate Republicans upset over millions of voters losing coverage and cuts in Medicaid, the health insurance program for the poor. These included Sens. Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, Susan Collins of Maine, Ohio’s Rob Portman and West Virginian Shelley Moore Capito.

The GOP’s fissures have changed little for months.

Conservatives like Sens. Mike Lee of Utah and Texas’ Ted Cruz want to loosen Obama’s requirements that insurers cover numerous services and cap customers’ costs, and some want to cut spending for Medicaid and other programs. Conservative Rand Paul, R-Ky., is most interested in simply repealing the 2010 law. Moderates want to ease the spending reductions and leave consumer protections in place.

“There’s a handful of folks who clearly have significant reservations” about backing the bill, said Sen. Pat Toomey, R-Pa. “But they haven’t said no. They haven’t said yes either.”