President Trump summoned Republican senators to the White House for lunch Wednesday, where he pressured them to pass a health care reform bill. Just yesterday Sen. Lisa Murkowski was one of three Republicans who crushed his Plan C, to just repeal the Affordable Care Act and replace it later. Now the president is back to Plan B, repeal and replace, and he’s impatient.
After 36 hours of open dissent to the president’s stated desires, this was a table set for awkwardness. Murkowski was placed one senator away from the president, on his left. West Virginia Sen. Shelley Moore Capito was just as near, on his right side. She is another senator who said “no” Tuesday to repealing the ACA without a replacement. Between her and the president: Sen. Dean Heller, R-Nevada, an early critic of the Senate health care bill
“We’re in this room today to deliver on our promise to the American people to repeal Obamacare and to ensure that they have the health care they need,” Trump said. “We have no choice.”
During the 10 minutes cameras were allowed, at the start of a two-hour lunch, Trump promised “tremendous competition” in insurance markets if Republican bills become law. He promised new forms of insurance that are unimaginable now. But first, he said, senators have to get rid of the Affordable Care Act.
“We can repeal it, but the best is repeal and replace,” Trump said. “And let’s get going. I intend to keep my promise, and I know you will too.”
But it’s not easy to craft a replacement that suits at least 50 GOP senators. Trump says they are close to a solution, yet six months into his presidency, Republicans are still scrambling for a plan that’s not too “mean,” — Trump’s knock on the House-passed bill — and not too expensive for Americans or their government. And Alaska’s two senators are split on how to go about it.
Back at the Capitol after the lunch, Murkowski said she doesn’t expect any retribution for her stand on Tuesday, and she didn’t feel Trump aimed any pointed barbs at her.
“No, no,” Murkowski said, adding, “I was not seated directly next to the president but pretty darned close.
Murkowski said she came out against a repeal-only bill because Alaskans want changes to the Affordable Care Act. She said she’s never seen Alaskans so engaged on an issue.
“And so I said, no we were not just going to walk away from this. We have an obligation to focus on the reform, on the on the fix, on the replace, whatever word it is you want to call,” Murkowski said. “People are saying ‘fix it.'”
Murkowski wants open hearings, which would give Democrats a chance to weigh in. She wants the bill to move in the classic way, through committees. She warns it’s going to take a while, and she does not want to repeal the ACA first. She said that amounts to “repeal and trust us” and she says it would roil the insurance markets.
At the White House lunch, Sen. Dan Sullivan was seated five senators away from the president. He agrees with Trump that Republicans, working as they have, among themselves, can get the job done.
“We’re very close. Why are we giving up now? And that was the theme of this lunch,” Sullivan said.
The Republican draft replacement bill, called the “Better Care Reconciliation Act,” already has a lot of good features, he said, and he’s still hoping for a vote on that soon.
“There’s a lot of elements – I mean, we’re still working through it but I think that (they) are going to be very positive for Alaska and the country,” Sullivan said.
It’s not clear that bill will be up for a vote in the near future. And first, Senate leaders may opt to take up the repeal-only bill. Sullivan has said he’d vote to move ahead with that, too. Murkowski is already a no, and now she’s been joined by a fourth Republican Senator, Rob Portman of Ohio.
Liz Ruskin is the Washington, D.C., correspondent at Alaska Public Media. Reach her at lruskin@alaskapublic.org. Read more about Liz here.
