“I think what you’re seeing is: We’re going through the inevitable growing pains of being an opposition party to becoming a governing party,” House Speaker Paul Ryan said. | Getty Ryan blames 'growing pains' for early divide over Obamacare replacement plan

House Speaker Paul Ryan on Wednesday attributed Republican division over GOP leaders’ Obamacare replacement plan to “growing pains.”

The House late Monday unveiled its plan to repeal and replace former President Barack Obama’s Affordable Care Act. That legislation, however, has met with opposition from conservative lawmakers and powerful conservative groups split on insurance tax credits and Medicaid expansion.


“I think what you’re seeing is: We’re going through the inevitable growing pains of being an opposition party to becoming a governing party,” Ryan told reporters at a news conference Wednesday morning. “And in being an opposition party, we had divided government.”

The Wisconsin Republican said nearly two-thirds of House Republicans “have never known what it’s like to work with a Republican president, to have unified government.”

“So it’s a new feel,” he added. “It’s a new system for people, but it’s all the more reason why we have to do what we said we would do and deliver for the American people and govern and use our principles. That’s what this is.”

Two House committees are set to mark up the bill Wednesday. Crediting Ways and Means Committee Chairman Kevin Brady and Energy and Commerce Committee Chairman Greg Walden for leading hearings, conferences, briefings and listening sessions this year, and soliciting feedback, Ryan touted the health care legislation as an inclusive process.

The chairmen, Ryan said, “got feedback on two provisions: whether we have a cap on the size of the credit or whether there’s a cap on the exclusion.”

“Those two concerns were addressed in the latest draft of the bill because, again, this is a participatory process. This is a bottom-up process,” he continued. “So those are the concerns that were brought to the committees of jurisdiction by lots of members, not just conservatives, but lots of members. And those concerns were addressed, again, because it’s an inclusive process.”