Getting closer.
Ryan: Repeal and replace will happen at the same time, much of it in the same bills
This is just a hunch, but I think Trump, Price, McConnell and Ryan are a lot further along in crafting the ObamaCare replacement than anyone has really said on the record.
First, Trump comes out this morning with this:
Not that Trump usually needs to be asked before he holds forth on social media, but that was awfully random unless it was prompted by something behind the scenes that we don't know about yet.
Next, Paul Ryan says this during a
CNN Town Hall:
"We want to do this at the same time, and in some cases in the same bill," Ryan said during a town hall in Washington sponsored by CNN and moderated by Jake Tapper. "So we want to advance repealing this law with its replacement at the same time."
Ryan said Republicans are moving "as quickly as they can" to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act, but said he doesn't yet have a date, and it will take "a little bit of time" to do so."We're working on this as fast as possible," he said, adding that the GOP will act "definitely within these first 100 days" of Trump's presidency.
Ryan's comments align the speaker with President-elect Donald Trump, who said at a news conference Wednesday that repealing and replacing Obamacare should happen "essentially simultaneously." Some Republicans on Capitol Hill have urged more caution, however, as the party tries to find consensus on a plan to replace the law that has insured millions of people.
When he says in the same bill, what I think he's talking about is that they believe they can include working in the reconciliation bill they will use for repeal that also sets in law the essential framework of the replacement bill. There are important reasons to do it this way. Assuming Senate Republicans aren't willing to kill the filibuster entirely - and
I think they should but that's a discussion for another day - they would need 60 votes for any element of the replacement that isn't included in the repeal/reconciliation bill. That means that if they can write the reconciliation bill in such a way that the basic framework is already codified into law, the Democrats can only filibuster implemenation details.
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That said, we still haven't gotten much from any of the principals involved about just what form the replacement bill might take - absent their issue positions as expressed in the recent past. If it's anything like
Trump's proposal from March or
Price's proposal from 2013, I'd do cartwheels. Actually I'd probably hurt myself if I tried to do cartwheels. Good thing ObamaCare would be gone.
My sense is that they're waiting until after the inauguration to release any details of the replacement, perhaps because if any of it were publicly known it would give Obama the opportunity to plant regulatory landmines before he heads out the door. They do seem awfully determined, though, to move this quickly - if only because striking early is necessaary to prevent people from getting cold feet as Democrats and the media ratchet up the anti-repeal propaganda.
The first week of Trump's presidency should be nothing if not action packed.
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