Amid opposition from members of the conservative House Freedom coalition and several Republican senators, the House of Representatives delayed its vote on the bill promoted by President Trump and House Speaker Paul Ryan as a repeal of Obamacare.
Republican members of the House were expected to meet Thursday evening to discuss their next steps.
A White House spokeswoman insisted, however, that debate will begin Thursday night and Republicans believe they will have enough votes to pass it on Friday.
President Trump has met with members of the House Freedom Caucus for the past two days to bring them on board.
The bill’s Republican opponents contend Ryan’s American Health Act doesn’t go far enough to repeal the Democrats’ Affordable Health Care Act, maintaining regulations and penalties they believe will not free the market and drive down the cost of insurance for consumers.
Freedom Caucus chairman Rep. Mark Meadows, R-N.C., told reporters “there are not enough votes” to pass the House leadership’s bill.
Asked by reporters at the daily White House briefing what would happen if the bill fails, spokesman Sean Spicer insisted: “It’s going to pass. So that’s it.”
Spicer maintained there is no “Plan B” for health care.
In the White House Cabinet Room Thursday, the health care bill came up as President Trump hosted trucking CEOs and several drivers.
He said that on Thursday the House “is voting to repeal and replace the disaster known as Obamacare.”
“We’ll see what happens. It’s going to be a very close vote. By the way, it’s close not because Obamacare’s good – it’s close for politics. They know it’s no good. Everybody knows it’s no good. Only, politics. We have a great bill and I think we have a very good chance. But it’s only politics,” Trump said, according to a pool report.
He noted the executives “had a big problem with Obamacare.”
“Obamacare has inflicted great pain on American truckers,” he said. “Many of you were forced to buy health insurance on the Obamacare exchanges. You experienced a crippling rise in premiums, and a dramatic loss in options. And you just take a look at what’s happened to the costs, and it’s incredible.
“You know the problems. And it’s put a lot of the trucking businesses out of business, which is pretty tough.”
FreedomWorks, an advocacy group associated with the tea-party movement, said that if Republican leaders were to promote the Obamacare repeal bill passed by Congress in 2015 and vetoed by President Obama, they would have a winner.
“We had hoped that there would be a deal today that would address House conservatives’ concerns with the American Health Care Act. Unfortunately, no agreement was reached,” said FreedomWorks President Adam Brandon.
“The last few weeks of drama could have been avoided if Speaker Paul Ryan and House leadership had provided a more open process and sought feedback early on from House conservatives, including the members of the Freedom Caucus.”
He said the only clear path for repealing Obamacare under a Republican president is the 2015 “clean repeal.”
“If Paul Ryan will push that bill, our activists will be behind him 100 percent to pressure Republicans to vote for it again,” he said.
“We’re ready to move on other issues on the legislative agenda, including fundamental tax reform, but we have to get this done.”
Sen. Tom Cotton, R-Ark., has dismissed the House leadership’s three-step plan to repeal and replace Obamacare as “just political talk.”
Republicans contend Senate rules limit the measures they can include in the current reconciliation bill. Step two would be regulatory changes and step three legislation such as opening the insurance market across state lines that would require 60 votes in the Senate.
Cotton argues the second step could be subject to court challenges and asserts step three would be “some mythical legislation in the future that is going to garner Democratic support and help us get over 60 votes in the Senate.”
“If we had those Democratic votes, we wouldn’t need three steps,” he said in a radio interview last week with Hugh Hewitt. “We would just be doing that right now on this legislation all together.”
