GOP leaders plan Tuesday health vote

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell of Ky. leaves the Senate chamber on Capitol Hill in Washington, Thursday, July 13, 2017, after announcing the revised version of the Republican health care bill. The bill has been in jeopardy because of opposition from within the GOP ranks. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite)
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell of Ky. leaves the Senate chamber on Capitol Hill in Washington, Thursday, July 13, 2017, after announcing the revised version of the Republican health care bill. The bill has been in jeopardy because of opposition from within the GOP ranks. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite)

WASHINGTON — Republican leaders pushed toward a Senate vote next Tuesday on resurrecting their health care bill. Their effort was complicated by the ailing GOP Sen. John McCain's potential absence and a report envisioning that the number of uninsured Americans would soar.

The White House and GOP leaders looked Thursday for ways to win over 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."

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

Moderate Republicans are 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.

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."

Sen. John Barrasso, R-Wyo., a member of the Senate leadership, said a vote was expected Tuesday afternoon. But senators suggested that might change with the possible long-term absence of McCain, the 80-year-old Arizonan who said Wednesday he is battling an aggressive brain cancer and was home undergoing treatment.

With a slender 52-48 majority and adamant Democratic opposition, McConnell has been unable to muster the 50 GOP votes he'd need to approve his party's health care overhaul. Vice President Mike Pence would cast the tie-breaking vote. Without McCain, the bill would fall if just two Republicans vote against it, and more than that have said they're ready to do so.

McConnell and his lieutenants were arguing that Republicans should back the initial procedural vote to begin debate. Should it pass, they reasoned, senators could force votes on any amendments they chose to propose.

In reality, senators were aware that that procedural vote would be viewed as a vote on whatever health care package leaders were pushing, perhaps reflecting changes negotiated with GOP senators. Several senators said leaders still hadn't decided what that might be.

Asked if senators would know beforehand what they'd be voting on Tuesday, No. 2 Senate GOP leader, John Cornyn of Texas, told reporters, "That's a luxury we don't have."

Read Friday's Arkansas Democrat-Gazette for full details.

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