Mitch McConnell hopes to forge agreement before Senate recess as Trump promises ‘great, great surprise’ – but polls show little support for measure

As Republican leadership attempts to heal the deep divisions in the party to save their stalled healthcare bill from collapse, some lawmakers are proposing a more novel solution: bipartisanship.



On Wednesday, Republicans paraded before Senate majority leader Mitch McConnell’s office with a range of concerns and demands about the healthcare bill, which a recent analysis found would leave 22 million more Americans without health insurance over the next decade.

But corralling the requisite 50 votes to pass their deeply unpopular plan may prove more difficult than working across the aisle after McConnell was forced to delay a vote this week because of a lack of support from within his own party.

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Republican senators with doubts about the legislation, which was crafted in secret and is not scheduled to have a public hearing, said on Wednesday that they were working with the leadership on changes that would address their concerns with the bill by the end of the week.

“Friday will be the most interesting day,” Shelley Moore Capito, a Republican of West Virginia, said on CNN’s New Day.

But Capito, who announced her opposition to the bill after the leadership postponed the vote, opened the door to working with Democrats if Republicans were unable to cobble together a plan that can pass with a simple majority.

“I don’t think it closes the door in the end if for some reason it fails,” she said. “I think then the floodgates probably open to reach a bipartisan compromise.”

Republican Lindsey Graham, of South Carolina, also said he would work across the aisle to find a solution if the bill failed. “Plan B for me is to sit down with Democrats after Obamacare collapses and find a way forward,” Graham told ABC.

Senate minority leader Chuck Schumer on Wednesday called for a “dramatic rethink” of the healthcare bill and laid out his conditions for working with Republicans and the White House to improve the healthcare law.

“I would like to make my friend on the Republican side and President Trump an offer: let’s turn over a new leaf,” Schumer said in a floor speech. “Let’s start over. Let’s abandon more tax breaks for the rich. Let’s abandon the cuts to Medicaid and discuss what the American people are concerned about: premiums, deductibles and the cost of quality healthcare.”

We’re gonna have a big surprise. We have a great healthcare package Donald Trump

He also issued a challenge to Trump to convene a summit of Republican and Democratic senators in Washington to debate and discuss healthcare reforms, as Barack Obama did in 2010 when he was trying to attract GOP support for his law, the Affordable Care Act [ACA].

The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office estimated on Monday that 22 million more Americans would be uninsured by the end of the coming decade as a result of the Senate bill, compared with the current law, while reducing the federal budget by $321bn. An analysis of the House version of the bill found that it would raise the number of uninsured Americans by 23 million.

Trump expressed optimism on Wednesday that the senators would be able to overcome their differences on healthcare and support a new version of the bill.

“This will be something really special if we can get it done,” Trump told reporters. “Hopefully we’ll have it soon.”

Trump was asked about Schumer’s offer to work with Republicans. “I don’t think he’s serious,” the president said. “He hasn’t been serious. Obamacare is such a disaster. And he wants to try and save something that’s hurting a lot of people.”

McConnell echoed this, accusing Democrats of refusing to work with Republicans “in a serious way” to fix many of the problems that have beset the healthcare law, including a difficulty attracting competition within the marketplaces. At least 46 counties do not currently have an insurer on their exchange in 2018.



Republican senators are divided over how to proceed on healthcare. As initially drafted, the bill would eliminate the ACA’s individual mandate, which requires everyone to have healthcare or face a penalty, while making steep cuts to Medicaid. A number of moderate senators, especially those in states that expanded Medicaid under the ACA and have large low-income populations that rely on the public insurance program, are uneasy about the cuts.

On Tuesday, Dean Heller, a Republican senator for Nevada, a state that expanded Medicaid, told constituents during a tele-town hall that it would be “very difficult” to win him over, according to Jon Ralston, editor of the Nevada Independent. In retaliation for Heller announcing his opposition to the bill, a Super Pac associated with Trump launched attack ads against the senator, which have since ceased.

Still, at least four senators believe the legislation in its current form doesn’t go far enough. In a letter to McConnell, Senator Rand Paul of Kentucky outlined his wishlist of changes that would earn his support for the legislation. Among his demands, he urged Republicans to abandon what he called a “bailout” for insurance companies and to eliminate rather than amend the law’s premium tax credits.

The negotiations get thornier with each passing day, especially as senators return to their districts, where they are expected to face protests and be inundated with constituents requesting that they abandon their repeal efforts.

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The Senate plan faces another hurdle. Like the House version, which was passed last month, the effort is extremely unpopular. Just 12% of Americans support the Senate Republican healthcare plan, according to a new USA Today/Suffolk University poll.

Meanwhile, 53% of respondents said Congress should either leave Obamacare untouched or keep its structure in place while fixing its problems.

An NPR/PBS NewsHour/Marist College poll found that Americans overall disapprove of the Senate bill 55% to 17%. In this poll, 21% of Republicans opposed the bill while just 35% supported it.

But the dilemma Republican senators face is that, after they have spent seven years promising a wholesale repeal of the law, their base is eager for them to follow through. Eight in 10 Republicans support repeal and close to one-third say it should be dismantled even if a plan is not ready, according to the USA Today/Suffolk University poll.



Across the Capitol on Wednesday, opponents of the Republicans’ repeal effort made their voices heard. Activists were arrested outside the offices of Republican senators Pat Toomey of Pennsylvania and Tom Cotton of Arkansas. Later on Wednesday, protesters from various organizations planned to form a “human chain” encircling the Capitol building.

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