Republicans press Obamacare repeal
Once again, GOP Sen. John McCain could be the key to the 50 votes needed to pass the measure.
WASHINGTON — With time growing short, President Donald Trump and Republican Senate leaders dove into a frantic hunt for votes Tuesday in a last-ditch effort to repeal and replace Obamacare. The pressure was intense, the outcome uncertain in a Capitol newly engulfed in drama over health care.
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, whose failure to pass an Obamacare repeal bill in July opened a bitter public rift with Trump, pressed hard for the newly revived effort, which had been left for dead as recently as a week or two ago. But in a sign he remained short of votes, McConnell refused to commit to bringing the legislation to the floor.
As in July, much of the focus was on Arizona Sen. John McCain. Would he step back in line with fellow Republicans now that there was a bill co-written by Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, his best friend in the Senate? McCain wasn’t saying. Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, another crucial vote, wasn’t talking either.
Republicans must act by Sept. 30 in the Senate or face the prospect of a Democratic filibuster. That blocking action is currently staved off by budget rules that will expire at the end of the fiscal year. The new legislation, by Graham and Sen. Bill Cassidy of Louisiana, would undo the central pillars of former President Barack Obama’s health care law, and replace them with block grants to the states so they could make their own health care coverage rules.
Democrats are unanimously opposed, arguing that the legislation would result in millions of Americans losing their health insurance, decrease access to affordable care and damage the Medicaid health program for the poor.
So McConnell must win the votes of 50 of the 52 Senate Republicans. That would amount to victory in the 100-member Senate, because GOP Vice President Mike Pence would then break a tie.
Pence appeared at the Capitol on Tuesday and declared the Trump administration was “all-in” on the effort.
If the bill does pass, House Speaker Paul Ryan has committed to pushing it through the House as-is, and straight to the president’s desk, according to Graham. After seven years of promises to get rid of “Obamacare,” Republicans would have finally succeeded. It would be a promise kept to the GOP base, yet one with uncertain and potentially devastating political consequences for the Republican Party given that millions of people would be likely to lose coverage.
The bill would let states set their own coverage requirements, allow insurers to boost prices on people with serious medical conditions and cut and reshape Medicaid.
By Tuesday evening the legislation remained at least one or two votes short.
The situation is nearly identical to where Republicans found themselves in July when McConnell made one last attempt to pass a stripped-down repeal bill. It failed in a tense late-night session, with McCain, newly diagnosed with brain cancer, casting the decisive “no” vote.