WASHINGTON \u2014 The White House is insisting that the Senate resume efforts to repeal and replace the nation’s\u00a0health\u00a0care law, signalling that President Donald Trump stands ready to end required payments to insurers this week to let \u201cObamacare implode\u201d and force congressional action.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe president will not accept those who said it’s, quote, ‘Time to move on,\u201d’ White House adviser Kellyanne Conway said.<\/p>\n
Those were the words used by Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., after the stunning early Friday morning defeat of the GOP bill to repeal former President Barack Obama’s signature legislative achievement. McConnell is already moving to other business, having scheduled Senate consideration later Monday on a judicial nomination.<\/p>\n
Conway said Trump was deciding whether to act on his threat to end cost-sharing reduction payments, which are aimed at trimming out-of-pocket costs for lower-income people. \u201cHe’s going to make that decision this week, and that’s a decision that only he can make,\u201d Conway said.<\/p>\n
For seven years, Republicans have promised that once they took power, they would scrap Obama’s overhaul and pass a replacement. But that effort crashed most recently in the Senate Friday.<\/p>\n
Republicans hold a 52-48 majority in the Senate, where no Democrats voted for the GOP bill and three Republicans defected in the final vote Friday. One of the GOP defectors, Sen. John McCain, has since returned to Arizona for treatment for brain cancer.<\/p>\n
\u201cDon’t give up Republican senators, the World is watching: Repeal & Replace,\u201d Trump said in a tweet.<\/p>\n
White House budget director Mick Mulvaney, when asked Sunday if no other legislative business should be taken up until the Senate acts again on\u00a0health\u00a0care, responded \u201cyes.\u201d<\/p>\n
While the House has begun a five-week recess, the Senate is scheduled to work two more weeks before a summer break. McConnell has said the unfinished business includes addressing a backlog of executive and judicial nominations, coming ahead of a busy agenda in September that involves passing a defense spending bill and raising the government’s borrowing limit.<\/p>\n
\u201cIn the White House’s view, they can’t move on in the Senate,\u201d Mulvaney said, referring to\u00a0health\u00a0legislation. \u201cThey need to stay, they need to work, they need to pass something.\u201d<\/p>\n
Trump warned over the weekend that he would end federal subsidies for\u00a0health\u00a0care insurance for Congress and the rest of the country if the Senate didn’t act soon. He was referring in part to a federal contribution for lawmakers and their staffs, who were moved onto Obamacare insurance exchanges as part of the 2010 law.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf a new HealthCare Bill is not approved quickly, BAILOUTS for Insurance Companies and BAILOUTS for Members of Congress will end very soon!\u201d Trump tweeted.<\/p>\n
The subsidies, totalling about $7 billion a year, help reduce deductibles and copayments for consumers with modest incomes. The Obama administration used its rule-making authority to set direct payments to insurers to help offset these costs. Trump inherited the payment structure, but he also has the power to end them.<\/p>\n
The payments are the subject of a lawsuit brought by House Republicans over whether the\u00a0health\u00a0law specifically included a congressional appropriation for the money, as required under the Constitution. Trump has only guaranteed the payments through July, which ends Monday.<\/p>\n
Sen. Susan Collins of Maine, one of the three Republican senators who voted against the GOP\u00a0health\u00a0bill on Friday, said she’s troubled by Trump’s claims that the insurance payments are a \u201cbailout.\u201d She said Trump’s threat to cut off payments would not change her opposition to the GOP\u00a0health\u00a0bill and stressed the cost-sharing reduction payments were critical to make insurance more affordable for low-income people.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe uncertainty about whether that subsidy is going to continue from month to month is clearly contributing to the destabilization of the insurance markets, and that’s one thing that Congress needs to end,\u201d said Collins, who wants lawmakers to appropriate money for the payments.<\/p>\n
\u201cI certainly hope the administration does not do anything in the meantime to hasten that collapse,\u201d she added.<\/p>\n
Trump previously said the law that he and others call \u201cObamacare\u201d would collapse immediately whenever those payments stop. He has indicated a desire to halt the subsidies but so far has allowed them to continue on a month-to-month basis.<\/p>\n
Conway spoke on \u201cFox News Sunday,\u201d Mulvaney appeared on CNN’s \u201cState of the Union\u201d and Collins was on CNN as well as NBC’s \u201cMeet the Press.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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