Archive for the ‘Rand Paul’ Category

White House Says Health Care Vote Is Close; Rand Paul Says Not So Much – HuffPost

As a White House official insisted Sunday that the Senate is on the verge of passing a bill to repeal and replace Obamacare, a key opponent of the bill said exactly the opposite.

Were getting close, White House Director for Legislative Affairs Marc Short said on Fox News Sunday. We hope that [when senators] come back the week after [their July 4th] recess, well have a vote.

But Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.), one of the main conservative critics of the bill as currently written, suggested on the same show the legislation should be junked and process of writing it begun anew.

I dont think were getting anywhere with the bill we have, Paul said. Were at an impasse.

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell delayed a vote until after the recess, saying he and his leadership team are still working toward getting at least 50 people in a comfortable place to vote for the bill.

Paul argued that the Senate should pass two bills one to repeal the Affordable Care Act that President Barack Obama shepherded through Congress, and another to replace it with the GOPs alternative.

Paul said the current bill has become the kitchen sink, and is lit up like a Christmas tree full of billion-dollar ornaments.

Paul did say that he hopes the Senate can get health care legislation passed before Congress takes its August recess.

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White House Says Health Care Vote Is Close; Rand Paul Says Not So Much - HuffPost

Rand Paul says splitting up health care bill could improve …

Sen. Rand Paul said Thursday that the health care bill should be split into two pieces of legislation in order to pass an Obamacare repeal.

"I think if we take this bill and split it into two pieces, we pass one that is more, looks like repeal that conservatives like. And then the other one you load up with all kinds of Christmas ornaments and gifts and money and just pile money on it that the Democrats will vote for and some of the Republicans will vote for," the Kentucky Republican said in an interview on MSNBC's "Morning Joe."

Paul predicts that "both [would] end up passing" if Senate Republicans pursued that path."It may not be completely good for the country, but you at least get the repeal that way," Paul added.

The repeal bill, he said, could repeal Obamacare's taxes and regulations and include Medicaid reform, but he said it would be "much narrower" and "much cleaner."

Paul reiterated that he doesn't "support the current bill and won't vote for it unless it changes or gets better." He was among the first few Senate Republicans to come out against the Better Care Reconciliation Act (BCRA) last week.

In the interview Thursday, Paul admitted that "half of the Republicans hate it," in addition to all of the Democrats. Republicans technically need 51 votes to pass the legislation, but one vote can be Vice President Mike Pence's tie-breaking vote. That means leadership needs at least 50 Senate Republicans to back it, and assuming all Democrats vote against it, Republicans can only afford two defections. The Senate currently has 52 Republicans and 48 Democrats.

Paul said Thursday he supports a plan that would expand beyond Obamacare.

"I'm for letting every individual in the market join a co-op or a buying group and then they would be part of a large group, they'd be protected against pre-existing conditions. But they'd also be able to get a cheaper price," he said. "But this only works if you free up and get rid of the mandates and regulations. Because you have to legalize inexpensive insurance."

Senate leadership is aiming to produce a revised health care bill by Friday to send to the Congressional Budget Office to be scored over the July 4 recess.

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Rand Paul says splitting up health care bill could improve ...

The statesmanship of Rand Paul – Conservative Review


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The statesmanship of Rand Paul
Conservative Review
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The statesmanship of Rand Paul - Conservative Review

Rand Paul says GOP still ‘at impasse’ over Obamacare repeal bill – Politico

"There's still quite a bit of disagreement," Sen. Rand Paul says. | Getty

Sen. Rand Paul said Thursday morning that he and his Republican colleagues remain at an impasse on striking a compromise on Obamacare repeal legislation and suggested that the only way to appease the moderate and conservative wings of the GOP might be to split the bill in two.

"I still sense that we're at impasse," Paul told Fox News Fox & Friends, adding, "There's still quite a bit of disagreement."

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Paul , of Kentucky, is one of at least eight GOP senators who have said that they oppose the repeal-and-replace legislation introduced by Republican leadership in the Senate last week. Some lawmakers, including Paul and other conservatives, have opposed the bill because, they say, it does not go far enough in repealing Obamacare, while other, more moderate members, like Sens. Dean Heller of Nevada, Susan Collins of Maine and Shelley Moore Capito of West Virginia argue the bills cuts are too severe.

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell is hoping to have a new deal at least in principle on the health care bill as soon as Friday, after GOP leadership was forced to pull a procedural vote earlier this week due to the lack of Republican support. Some details have started to emerge about a potential compromise, including adding at least $45 billion to address the opioid crisis and allowing consumers to use Health Savings Account money to pay for their premiums.

But Paul said a solution is to split the GOPs health care agenda into two bills: a clean repeal to appease conservatives by completely undoing Obamacare and a second bill focused on spending that could be hashed out between Democrats and moderate Republicans.

Do the repeal, which no Democrat will vote for, repeal the taxes, repeal the regulations, and fix the Medicaid that helps to pay for everything, Paul said. No Democrats will vote for anything good like that. But Democrats will always vote for spending. So the big-government Republicans that want more spending take the spending and put it in a bill that the Democrats will vote for.

Paul said he had suggested his strategy to President Donald Trump on Wednesday during a conversation about the health care legislation and that the president seemed open to the idea. The Kentucky senator said such a plan could benefit from Trumps leadership and that the president has the force of personality and the bully pulpit of the presidency to force it through.

The schism among Senate Republicans is similar to the one their House colleagues managed to bridge in May with the passage of repeal-and-replace legislation that the White House celebrated with a Rose Garden pep rally. But even in the House, where the Republican majority is wider than it is in the Senate, GOP members struggled to find compromise and managed to narrowly pass their health care bill by only a handful of votes on a second attempt.

In the Senate, Republicans can afford to lose just two GOP votes and still pass their measure. Any legislation passed by the Senate would need to be reconciled with the House version before going to the presidents desk.

Well, see, the typical way in Washington that they fix things is they give everybody money, and I think that's what's going to happen now, Paul said of the negotiation process. Half of them want more money, and half of them want less money. Thats why it doesnt work to have one bill, because every time you stuff more money in it for the moderates, it offends the conservatives.

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Rand Paul says GOP still 'at impasse' over Obamacare repeal bill - Politico

The Return of the Repeal-and-Delay Strategy for Killing Obamacare – New York Magazine

Rand Paul and Donald Trump together helped kill the original GOP strategy for repealing Obamacare but delaying a replacement. Now they are trying to bring it back. Photo: Ron Sachs - Pool/Getty Images

Back in that dreamy period for Republicans between November 8, 2016, and Donald Trumps inauguration, when all things reactionary seemed possible, the consensus plan for dealing with Obamacare was called repeal and delay. It involved using the budget-reconciliation process to quickly repeal those elements of the Affordable Care Act that were not strictly regulatory in nature, but with delayed effective dates so that a full Obamacare replacement plan could be worked out at leisure, quite possibly with some Democratic support given the ticking time bomb of full repeal. This strategy had the great merit of letting congressional Republicans quickly keep their promise to bring down the great white whale of Obamacare, without immediately facing the consequences in terms of people losing insurance, or facing higher costs for skimpier coverage. And it also protected Republicans themselves from their own vast internal disagreements over the ultimate shape and structure of the health-care system.

But the agreement over repeal and delay quickly collapsed, with the key moment being a conversation between Trump and a U.S. senator on January 9:

Senator Rand Paul let the world know that hed gotten a phone call from President-elect Donald Trump wherein the mogul expressed agreement with Pauls argument that Obamacare should be repealed and replaced in a single action.

Other senators began expressing concerns about repeal and delay, and Trump delivered the coup de grce in his first post-election press conference when he talked about an Obamacare-replacement bill being passed most likely on the same day or the same week but probably the same day could be the same hour as repeal legislation.

Nearly a half-year later, with legislation to partially repeal and partially replace Obamacare teetering on the brink of failure in the Senate, the idea of a repeal and delay strategy is suddenly being promoted by wait for it Rand Paul and Donald Trump.

To be clear, Paul is not talking about the sort of very extended delays in consideration of a replacement bill (some thought until after the 2018 midterms) the original repeal-and-delay promoters contemplated. At one point he hints a bill extending the Childrens Health Insurance Program (CHIP), needed later this year, might be the appropriate vehicle.

What Pauls 180-degree turn on repeal and delay signifies, though, is the realization of some conservatives that insisting on simultaneous repeal and replacement was a big strategic error. It encouraged Republican moderates to fight for retention of some key elements of Obamacare in the replacement bill and thus eroded support for anything like a full repeal.

With respect to Trump, though, its anyones guess what, if anything, his sudden support for two different actions on health care means. He could be reacting very immediately to the prospect of total failure on health care, which is what still another Republican senator was talking about in proposing a two-bill approach, as noted by Jonathan Cohn:

Trumps tweet seemed to be endorsing an idea that Sen. Ben Sasse (R-Neb.) floated minutes earlier on Fox News and, according to the The Wall Street Journal, in a formal letter to the White House that if Senate leaders cant assemble a majority by July 10, they should try a different strategy: Vote to repeal the bill outright, or at least strip its funding, and then spend a month in non-stop hearings and negotiations to hammer out a deal on a new coverage scheme.

In any event, the immediate reaction from Mitch McConnells circle was chilly, as Caitlin Owens reports:

Senate Republican aides quickly shot down President Trumps tweet this morning, which said that if Senate Republicans cant pass their current health care bill, they should repeal the Affordable Care Act first and then replace it later.

Not going to happen, said one senior GOP aide. 15 votes for that strategy. Which is why we are where we are.

Bingo. The logic of repeal and delay is no better or worse than it was in January, when Trump and Paul successfully opposed it. Perhaps the worst sign for Republicans on health care is that they are now clearly going in circles.

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The Return of the Repeal-and-Delay Strategy for Killing Obamacare - New York Magazine