Republicans have finally given up on voting on a bill to repeal President Obama’s Affordable Care Act.Republicans have finally given up on voting on a bill to repeal President Obama’s Affordable Care Act. On Monday night, after weeks of failing to drum up enough support in the Senate to pass a Mitch McConnell–helmed legislative effort that promised to strip 22 million Americans of their health care in the name of a tax cut for the wealthy, the BCRA officially became DOA, when two Republican senators, Mike Lee of Utah and Jerry Moran of Kansas, publicly declared they could not back the bill. The two joined Kentucky’s Rand Paul and Maine’s Susan Collins, who had already declared themselves against the bill as well. The two most recent defections, which effectively tanked any possibility of the bill’s passing, apparently happened as President Trump was hosting a dinner for some senators in the hopes of swaying them to his side. According to Politico, Trump told his guests: “We have the Senate, House, and White House, and we have to do it or we’re going to look terrible.” Before the dinner ended, Lee and Moran released their statements against the bill, and McConnell was forced to withdraw it. After news of their defections spread, Trump took to Twitter to weigh in on the failed effort. “Republicans should just REPEAL failing Obamacare now and work on a new health-care plan that will start from a clean slate,” he wrote on Monday night. He added this morning: “As I have always said, let Obamacare fail and then come together and do a great health-care plan. Stay tuned.” While the bill’s failure in the Senate is certainly a victory for those in support of the Affordable Care Act (and for the millions of Americans who get to keep their health insurance), McConnell has given no indication that he is ready to fully surrender. On Monday night, he announced his latest strategy: Instead of repeal and replace, the Senate majority leader is going to try to pass a full repeal and figure out the replacement aspect later on. In a statement drafted yesterday, McConnell promised a vote “in the coming days” on a 2015 House bill that called for a repeal of Obamacare (which President Obama then vetoed), with “a two-year delay to provide for a stable transition period to a patient-centered health-care system that gives Americans access to quality, affordable care.” But experts warn that fully repealing the ACA without an alternative would leave millions without insurance overnight (back in 2015, the Congressional Budget Office predicted around 32 million people would lose their health care and premiums would go up 100 percent) and that a repeal-only bill could cause insurance markets to collapse—an option that is unlikely to gain favor among skeptical Republican senators. It’s left to see which road McConnell will try to go down. For now, the ACA remains in place, but if Trump’s tweets are anything to go by, his effort to dismantle Obama’s health-care legacy remains a priority—despite all indications that even his own party isn’t sold on the idea. “We were let down by all of the Democrats and a few Republicans,” he wrote. “Most Republicans were loyal, terrific, and worked really hard. We will return!”
POST: 2023-03-22