The healthcare repeal and replace saga has seemed never ending over the past few months, but it could finally be coming to a close (at least for the time being) for the GOP leadership spearheading the efforts to install “Trumpcare” instead of the 7-year old Obamacare. On Thursday, the House tried to coordinate a vote to repeal the ACA and replace it with the newly crafted AHCA which is as newly crafted as is even possible since edits were being made overnight. After delaying the vote multiple times before finally canceling it completely (and Paul Ryan’s planned victory press conference) the decision was finally made to postpone the vote for a few days while the plan can be further revised and Republican support can be curried in order to switch certain allegiances.
Unfortunately for the GOP and their efforts to be at all organized about this process, Donald Trump does not want to wait a few days before finding out whether the AHCA will go through or not. Much like Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory‘s Veruca Salt, Trump wants that vote now.
According to a new report from The New York Times Trump and his team issued an ultimatum to the Republican Party during an after hours meeting Thursday night that directed the House to force a vote on the new healthcare plan or lose their chance to pass the legislation at all. Apparently, Trump is content with leaving Obamacare in place for the foreseeable future if his party can’t make it happen. Which is not exactly music to the GOP’s ears seeing as they have been promising a successful repeal of Obamacare since the day it was signed. Sources also say that Trumps negotiating skills weren’t enough to convince many people to support the bill, even with the changes made last minute.
One reason Trump’s negotiations with the House Freedom Caucus and others might not be panning out, other than that it’s possible he could be overstating his deal-making prowess, is that the deal polling overwhelmingly negatively with the latest support hovering around 17% — not ideal. Even with accessions to the conservative contingents in the House being added to the bill, such as removing the requirement that insurance companies cover hospital visits or maternity care, the poll numbers stayed terrible and the vote outlook remained against the GOP. According to The Washington Post, the changes to the bill this week would leave the same amount of Americans uninsured when all is said and done and somehow manage to be a more expensive option.
The first version of the bill would have reduced the federal deficit by more than $300 million while the latest version only cuts about $150 million from the deficit. This is all while leaving 24 million people uninsured and raising individual premiums nearly 20%. The best negotiating in the world can only do so much when trying to sell a plan structured like that.
If Obamacare is sticking around for a while it should be fine though, as it isn’t “collapsing” any time soon.
By the way @SpeakerRyan lied again tonight. Obamacare is NOT collapsing. It just got 12.2 million new signups by the January deadline.
— Nope. (@JoyAnnReid) March 24, 2017