Conservatives near revolt on Senate health care negotiations
Republicans are increasingly pessimistic that key conservative senators will vote for the eventual bill.
Conservative senators and allied outside groups are on the verge of rebellion against the Senate’s Obamacare repeal effort
.. the Senate bill continues to tilt toward more moderate members of the GOP on keeping some of Obamacare’s regulatory structure and providing a more generous wind-down of the law’s Medicaid expansion. The movement has made Republicans increasingly pessimistic that two critical conservative senators, Mike Lee of Utah and Rand Paul of Kentucky, will be able to vote for the GOP’s ultimate agreement
.. it keeps “90 percent” of Obamacare, said he opposes the creation of high-risk pools favored by many Republicans, and urged Republicans to abandon attempts to save the individual marketplace with an infusion of cash.
.. “We promised the voters that we’d repeal Obamacare,” Paul said. “Instead, we want to repeal sort of a tiny bit of it and replace it with something that looks a lot like Obamacare.”
.. The outline leadership has presented isn’t Obamacare repeal, in fact it isn’t even reform. It’s a tax cut and a corporate bailout masquerading as health legislation,” said a conservative Senate aide.
.. The original plan was to pass a 2015 bill, vetoed by President Barack Obama, that would essentially have scrapped much of the law with no replacement.
.. they know an ideological reckoning is upon the party