“We will show to the American people who actually wants to repeal Obamacare and who does not,” said caucus member Rep. Mo Brooks. | AP Photo Freedom Caucus divided on tool to force Obamacare repeal vote Conservative hard-liners are weighing a thorny procedural move.

House Freedom Caucus conservatives who brought down the GOP’s Obamacare replacement bill are divided over whether they should try to force a floor vote on a repeal-only bill with a procedural tool that could put their GOP colleagues in a bind.

Several of the group’s most rock-ribbed conservatives are already setting in motion plans to file a so-called discharge petition. The legislative mechanism forces the chamber to vote on legislation — in this case, one of the group member’s Obamacare repeal bills — after it garners more than 216 lawmakers' signatures.


“We will show to the American people who actually wants to repeal Obamacare and who does not,” said caucus member Rep. Mo Brooks (R-Ala.), who filed a full repeal of the 2010 health law on Friday but says he must wait 30 days until he begins collecting signatures for a discharge petition.

But several members of the hard-line caucus, including Chairman Mark Meadows (R-N.C.), pushed back on the idea. The North Carolina Republican said there’s “nothing to” the notion that the group would try to force the vote. Even Rep. Dave Brat (R-Va.), who took out ex-Majority Leader Eric Cantor in a 2014 primary, said he personally is “not looking at that right now.”

The idea came up during the group’s Monday night meeting.

Such a petition could cause major headaches for the broader House GOP conference. While it’s unclear the group could garner that many signatures — many House Republicans are furious with the Freedom Caucus and blame them for killing the House GOP alternative — the document would allow big-name outside groups to browbeat lawmakers to add their names.

Those groups, like the Club for Growth and Heritage Action, would no doubt call on Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) to allow the bill on the floor, even though Ryan, like Trump, does not want to vote on repeal without some replacement.

The Freedom Caucus members who don’t like the idea are trying to work with centrist Republicans right now to find out if they can come to some sort of agreement on a GOP alternative, in hopes of getting what one member said was about 40 or so “nos” on both ends of the conference to yes, and allowing them to vote on a bill.

“I think it should come back, that’s my personal opinion,” said group member Trent Franks (R-Ariz.) of the GOP bill that Ryan pulled last Friday. Franks had switched his vote to yes after Trump called him personally.

Asked about a discharge petition, Rep. Scott DesJarlais, the HFC’s earliest and most adamant Trump supporter, said, “I don’t know whether that will be doable or not.” He said a repeal-only bill goes against what Trump promised on the campaign trail, so it needs to include replacement measures, too.

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“The president promised he wants to repeal and replace at the same time and that’s what he ran on and won on, so we have to find a way to make that happen,” the Tennessee Republican said.

Many House Republicans, meanwhile, are pushing their leadership to try to bring the Ryan bill up again. They want to vote on it on the floor, and hope that enough of their colleagues who were against it last time are now feeling remorseful for blocking progress. They hope they can get them to yes.

GOP leaders say they’re having conversations about next steps behind closed doors. No decision has been made, but leaders say they feel they have to do something on health care and can’t just throw their hands up because they failed the first time.

“We want to get it right,” Speaker Paul Ryan told reporters after a GOP conference meeting Tuesday. “We’re going to keep talking to each other until we get it right. I'm not going to put a timeline on it, because this is too important to not get right and to put an artificial timeline on it.”