×

McConnell faces a challenge passing health care in Senate

WASHINGTON (AP) — For Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, writing a Republican-only health care bill that can pass the Senate boils down to this question: How do you solve a problem like Dean, Lisa, Patrick, Ted, Rand and Susan?

Those are some GOP senators whose clashing demands McConnell, R-Ky., must resolve. Facing solid Democratic opposition to demolishing former President Barack Obama’s 2010 overhaul, Republicans will lose if just three of their 52 senators defect.

In a report that complicated McConnell’s task, the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office delivered a damaging critique last week of the GOP-written bill the House approved May 4. It concluded the measure would create 23 million additional uninsured Americans by 2026.

As GOP senators try crafting a bill, here are some problems facing McConnell:

23 MILLION?

Booting that many people off health care coverage is a nonstarter for many Republican senators. It’s a campaign attack ad that writes itself.

MEDICAID

The House bill would halt extra federal funds in 2020 that 31 states get for Obama’s expansion of Medicaid — the federal-state health care program for poorer and disabled Americans. The legislation would also give states fixed federal sums annually, ending the open-ended payments Washington has always made to reflect growing medical expenses and caseloads.

This means an $834 billion cut over the coming decade that would produce 14 million, or 17 percent, fewer Medicaid beneficiaries than projected, the budget office said.

Twenty GOP senators are from states that expanded Medicaid, and most oppose abruptly ending the Obama law’s extra federal payments. They include moderates like Sen. Rob Portman of Ohio, Alaska’s Lisa Murkowski, Shelley Moore Capito of West Virginia and Dean Heller of Nevada.

CONSERVATIVES

Many conservatives want to curb Medicaid spending. In one proposal, they’d phase out extra federal Medicaid expansion money over a decade but reductions would begin next year.

Conservative GOP Sens. Ted Cruz of Texas and Mike Lee of Utah want to erase Obama insurance coverage requirements. These include obliging insurers to charge the same premiums for healthy people and those with pre-existing medical conditions, and forcing them to cover benefits such as maternity care.

ABORTION

Murkowski and Maine Sen. Susan Collins have opposed past moves to block federal payments to Planned Parenthood, whose services include abortions.

Newsletter

Today's breaking news and more in your inbox

I'm interested in (please check all that apply)
Are you a paying subscriber to the newspaper? *
   

Starting at $4.62/week.

Subscribe Today