Democratic Sen. Patty Murray of Washington (left) and Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.) negotiated the deal. Alexander and Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) both spoke to the president about it on Wednesday evening. | J. Scott Applewhite/AP GOP to Trump: Stop flip-flopping on Obamacare deal The president has alternately praised the plan and dismissed it — confusing lawmakers and slowing momentum for a fix to the health law.

Key Senate Republicans are urgently trying to get President Donald Trump to reconsider his apparent opposition to a bipartisan deal shoring up health insurance markets, several senators said Thursday morning.

Sens. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina and Lamar Alexander of Tennessee, who negotiated the deal with Democratic Sen. Patty Murray of Washington, both spoke to the president about it on Wednesday evening. Trump has variously praised the deal and trashed it as a “bailout” of insurance companies, and both Graham and Alexander are trying to pull him back from the brink.


In a conversation on Wednesday, Trump told Graham: “I want a deal. I want to get something for this money,” Graham recounted. The South Carolina Republican responded by explaining that Republicans’ bills to repeal and replace Obamacare continued the law's subsidy payments, called cost-sharing reductions, and argued the plan is a bridge to the Obamacare repeal bill he wrote with Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-La.).

“I told him that if Graham-Cassidy became law tomorrow, you’ve got two or three years before this thing gets implemented. You’ve got to do something in the interim period,” Graham said in an interview. “You can’t save Obamacare but you can keep the markets from collapsing until we get a replacement, which will be Graham-Cassidy.”

Graham said he talked with White House officials again on Thursday and encouraged people to make a deal within the “realm” of reason.

Alexander, who introduced the bill Thursday with support from 11 other Senate Republicans and 12 Democrats, said it was his fourth phone call from the president over the past 10 days.

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"I appreciate the president’s encouragement to create a short-term bipartisan solution and his willingness to consider it," Alexander said.

GOP supporters of the Alexander-Murray bill on Thursday also pushed back on the notion that the bill is a sign Republicans have given up on repeal.

"Even if we do Graham-Cassidy in the future, we still need this product," said Sen. Mike Rounds (R-S.D.), noting they can make changes to the state waivers in a way they couldn't under the strict Senate rules used to repeal Obamacare with 50 votes. "We also know it takes two years to implement Graham-Cassidy."

Trump canceled the cost-sharing reduction payments last week, and days later Alexander and Murray struck a deal to fund the payments for two years while providing new flexibility for states to get waivers from some Obamacare regulations. Trump has sent contradictory signals about whether he would sign the bill, calling it a “good solution” the same day he said it amounted to “bailouts” for the insurance companies.

On Thursday, Trump again sounded warmer to the idea. He praised Alexander and Murray but warned that he wants only a short-term solution to keep repeal alive and doesn't want insurance companies to benefit.

"I respect very much the two senators you’re talking about. I love that they’re working on it. I want them to be careful with respect to the insurance companies," Trump said. "We will probably like a very short-term solution, until we hit the block grants, until that all kicks in. ... And if they can do something like that, I’m open to it."

The indecision puzzles Republicans and infuriates Democrats.

“He’s for the bill one day, against it the next,” said an exasperated Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) on Thursday. “We can only hope he comes around and grasps what’s in the bill.”

Schumer later told reporters all 48 Democrats support the bill. With the dozen Republican co-sponsors, that would be enough for passage if Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell brings it to the floor.

But Senate Republicans are divided on whether to back the Alexander-Murray bill and some indicated they're not ready to support a bill until the president does.

“We’ve got to have something the president is directionally OK with — versus at least yesterday, opposed to — and something the House is directionally OK with,” said Sen. Thom Tillis (R-N.C.), who said if there is momentum, he’d be ready to support it. “This is a national narrative that only the president can help us shape.”

Alexander is trying to play the long game. Bringing the bill up as a standalone measure would force a high-profile, divisive vote in the Senate with no assurance the House would even take it up. Instead, the deal could be included in a year-end government funding bill.

"By the end of the year, chances are very good this agreement or something like it is law," Alexander said Wednesday.

Republican co-sponsors include Rounds, Graham, John McCain of Arizona, Susan Collins of Maine, Joni Ernst of Iowa, Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, Johnny Isakson of Georgia, Richard Burr of North Carolina, Bob Corker of Tennessee, Bill Cassidy of Louisiana and Chuck Grassley of Iowa.

The GOP co-sponsors include moderates and members of the Senate GOP's governing wing, including Collins, Murkowski, Burr and Corker. But the support from conservatives like Ernst and a Trump-whisperer like Graham could be pivotal to getting more Republicans on board.

Senate Finance Committee Chairman Orrin Hatch is a harder sell: “I’m not a big fan of what Lamar’s trying to do,” he said.

Some Republicans simply want to muscle the package through regardless of Trump's confusing comments.

“If there’s a package that’s supported by the majority of the American people and the Congress, then we will pass it,” insisted McCain.

But the president’s inconsistent statements have stalled the bill’s momentum among GOP leaders.

Senate Majority Whip John Cornyn of Texas said he fears that without separate action on the bill, Democrats will try to attach it to a year-end spending bill and weaken the GOP’s negotiating position.

So GOP leaders are hoping for clarity, and soon.

“I don’t think there’s any chance of passing it without the president’s support,” Cornyn said. “The majority leader is going to want to have some clarity on whether this is going to be a futile exercise or whether it’s going to produce a result.”

Democrats say they’re not concerned about what Republicans have to say to get the Obamacare funding approved.

“I’m not going to criticize Republicans for the internal arguments they’re making ,” Sen. Chris Murphy (D-Conn.). “However we get Trump’s hands off the wheel of the American health care system, I’ll take it.”

Complicating things further, House Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) has said he believes that the Senate “should keep its focus on repeal and replace of Obamacare.”

“The House has objected. But you’ve got to remember that in the House’s bill, they had the CSRs continue for two years,” Graham said. “That’s what I told the president: ‘I just don’t see a transition to Obamacare to a block grant that doesn’t require at least a couple years to implement.’”