House GOP pulls ACA replacement bill ahead of vote

WASHINGTON — After a week spent trying to whip the 215 votes needed to pass the American Health Care Act — the House GOP replacement for the Affordable Care Act — Republican leadership withdrew the bill from consideration Friday afternoon, sending the House into recess. Speaker Paul Ryan, R-Wis., held a press conference in which he explained his rationale for pulling the bill, noting that he spoke to President Donald Trump before doing so and the president agreed with the decision. 

 

“I will not sugarcoat this. This is a disappointing day for us,” Ryan said at the news conference. “Doing big things is hard. All of us will need time to reflect on how we got to this moment and how we could do it better.” 

 

Ahead of the vote, the bill was not expected to pass, with the New York Times tallying 33 “no” votes among House Republicans — about 10 more than the maximum 22 opposed votes that the legislation could have survived. It tallied 150 votes in favor, 45 undecided and nine who were leaning no or had concerns about the bill. 

 

Despite the uncertainty, Thursday night, Trump’s director of the Office of Management and Budget, Mick Mulvaney, reportedly told House Republicans that they would need to vote Friday, or the president would leave the ACA in place and pursue the rest of his policy agenda. 

 

The president tried to drum up support on Twitter Friday, tweeting, “After seven horrible years of ObamaCare (skyrocketing premiums & deductibles, bad healthcare), this is finally your chance for a great plan!”

 

In the lead-up to the vote, White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer said in Friday’s press briefing that the president had “called every member” and “done every single thing he can…to get this thing through,” noting that the president has made clear that House Republicans would be “the ones who have to go back and answer to their constituents why they didn’t fulfill a pledge that they made,” namely the repeal of the ACA that many campaigned on.

 

“You’ve all heard me say this before — moving from an opposition party to a governing party comes with growing pains — and, well, we’re feeling those growing pains today,” Ryan said. “I’m really proud of the bill we produced. It would make a dramatic improvement in our healthcare system and provide relief by people hurting under Obamacare.”

 

“This was a victory for all Americans. Democrats — united by our shared values — have stood strong against the disastrous #TrumpCare bill,” House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., tweeted Friday afternoon. 

 

But Friday’s bill withdrawal leaves the healthcare debate far from over. A recent Harvard-Harris Poll survey found that, though 51% of those surveyed felt the AHCA would have been a step backward, 49% still favor repealing and replacing the ACA. The survey found that 64% felt controlling healthcare costs was the highest healthcare priority, compared with 36% who felt the top priority should be covering more people.