WASHINGTON
(Reuters) - Senate Republicans announced plans to vote next week on their
latest bid to scuttle Obamacare even as a popular comedian who has become part
of the U.S. healthcare debate denounced the bill and former President Barack
Obama on Wednesday warned of “real human suffering.”
President
Donald Trump, who has expressed frustration at the Senate’s failure thus far to
pass legislation dismantling Obama’s signature legislative achievement, said
“47 or 48” Republicans back the bill, which needs 50 votes for passage in the
100-seat Senate, which his Republican Party controls 52-48.
“We think
this has a very good chance,” Trump, who made replacing Obamacare a top 2016
campaign promise, told reporters during an appearance with Egypt’s president in
New York.
Kentucky
Senator Rand Paul opposes the bill. At least five other Republicans are
undecided on it: Susan Collins of Maine, Lisa Murkowski and Dan Sullivan of
Alaska, John McCain of Arizona and Jerry Moran of Kansas.
Republican
Senator John Thune on Fox News said: “We’re a handful of votes short of having
the 50 that we need.”
As they
worked to gather enough votes to win, after prior legislation failed in July,
congressional Republicans and the White House were on the defensive after Jimmy
Kimmel used his late-night TV show to blast the proposal and call Republican
Senator Bill Cassidy, one of its two sponsors, a liar.
“This guy,
Bill Cassidy, just lied right to my face,” Kimmel said on his show on Tuesday
night, referring to the senator who since May had touted a “Jimmy Kimmel test”
of standards any Obamacare replacement would need to possess.
Senate
Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, who was noncommittal on Tuesday about
scheduling a vote, now intends to bring it to the Senate floor next week, said
his spokesman David Popp.
Republicans
are using the measure Cassidy is sponsoring with fellow Senator Lindsey Graham
to make one last push this year to pass legislation to roll back the 2010
Obamacare law, a goal of theirs for seven years, facing a Sept. 30 deadline.
Avalere
Health, a healthcare consultancy to hospitals and insurers, forecast that the
bill would slash federal funding to states by $215 billion through 2026, with
34 states facing cuts.
Hit hard
would be Democratic-governed California and New York, which expanded the
Medicaid insurance program for the poor and disabled under Obamacare, while
Republican-governed Texas, which did not expand Medicaid, would be a winner,
Avalere said.
It remained
unclear if the bill, opposed by Democrats and top medical groups and hospitals,
can attract the 50 votes needed for passage, with Vice President Mike Pence
ready to cast a tie-breaking vote.
OBAMA WARNS
In a speech
in New York, Obama defended the Affordable Care Act, known informally as
Obamacare, which expanded medical insurance to 20 million Americans.
“So when I
see people trying to undo that hard-won progress for the 50th or 60th time,
with bills that would raise costs or reduce coverage or roll back protections
for older Americans or people with pre-existing conditions ... it is
aggravating,” the Democratic former president said.
“And it’s
certainly frustrating to have to mobilize every couple of months to keep our
leaders from inflicting real human suffering on our constituents.”
Cassidy
defended his bill, which would divvy up healthcare money as block grants to
states, let them opt out of some Obamacare consumer protections and waive
requirements that insurers cover certain benefits. It also would end
Obamacare’s Medicaid expansion.
Kimmel
entered the healthcare debate after revealing on his show in May that his
newborn son had undergone life-saving emergency surgery for a congenital heart
condition, and pleaded that no family be denied medical care because they
cannot afford it. Cassidy appeared that month on “Jimmy Kimmel Live!”
“He said he
would only support a healthcare bill that made sure a child like mine would get
the health coverage he needs no matter how much money his parents make,” Kimmel
said on Tuesday.
“Stop using
my name, OK? Because I don’t want my name on it. There’s a new ‘Jimmy Kimmel
test’ for you. It’s called the lie detector test. You’re welcome to stop by the
studio and take it any time,” he said to cheers from his audience.
KIMMEL
BLASTED
Cassidy, a
gastroenterologist who represents Louisiana, gave a measured response to
Kimmel’s remarks, telling reporters on Capitol Hill, “It was a personal attack
and I can’t help that.”
Graham
blasted the comedian.
“I bet he
looked at some liberal talking point, bought it hook, line and sinker, and went
after Bill Cassidy without talking to him. And I think that’s unfair,” Graham
said on Fox News Channel’s “Fox & Friends” show.
Cassidy said
his proposal would protect people who are already ill, although it does let
states waive an Obamacare mandate that insurers cannot charge people who have
pre-existing medical conditions more than those who are healthy.
“There is a
specific provision that says that if a state applies for a waiver, it must
ensure that those with pre-existing conditions have affordable and adequate
coverage,” Cassidy told CNN.
Trump, in a
tweet late on Wednesday, said he would not sign the bill if it did not include
coverage of pre-existing conditions. “It does! A great bill,” Trump said.
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