Republicans Might Lack Votes In Senate To Repeal Obamacare

As I discussed earlier in the week, it was far easier for Republicans to vote to repeal Obamacare when it would be blocked by a filibuster or veto. Republicans might not have the votes in the Senate for repeal. The plan was to repeal the Affordable Care Act through budget reconciliation, where only a simple majority is necessary, with promises to replace it with something else in the future. The absurdity of that is obvious to pretty much everyone who is not a Republican.

The Republicans might not be able to achieve even a simple majority to repeal Obamacare. Now four Republicans, Rand Paul, Bob Corker, Tom Cotton, and Susan Collins are now showing skepticism towards the plan. Susan Collins also opposes the plans to defund Planned Parenthood.

Bloomberg reports that it is unclear how this will play out:

Only one of the senators — Rand Paul of Kentucky — has so far said he plans to vote against the procedural gambit that sets up Obamacare repeal, citing unrelated budget concerns. Paul and three others are concerned that Republicans haven’t said yet how they would replace the health insurance scheme after repeal, with one of them also opposing the plan to defund Planned Parenthood as part of the repeal.

The skeptics could end up yielding to pressure from their colleagues to support the plan when it reaches the Senate floor, but Republicans can only afford to lose two senators. If they lose a third, the effort would stall, and they’d be forced to return to the drawing board. Such a delay would be an embarrassing setback for Republicans, given the intense pressure from conservatives and the Trump team to speed this through.

One problem faced by the Affordable Care Act is that, with lack of Republican cooperation, it was rarely possible to pass further legislation to make adjustments, which a program this massive would normally receive. The ideal situation would be if Republicans fail to defund Obamacare and are forced to take ownership of health care policy, leading them to work in a bipartisan manner with Democrats to pass an improved plan. Unfortunately we cannot count on the Republicans acting in such a reasonable manner.