Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) said Monday that House Republicans’ bill to repeal Obamacare becomes more unpopular “the more exposure it gets.”
“Can Senator McConnell get this bill passed in the Senate?” a reporter asked Schumer during a press conference.
“Well, if you look at how many Republicans have spoken out against the bill, and you know Senator Cotton is not someone I can usually agree with, but he said, don’t do it so fast,” Schumer said.
Sen. Tom Cotton (R-AR) said on Sunday that the bill “cannot pass the Senate” and Republicans will put their majority in the House “at risk next year” if they vote in its favor.
Schumer told reporters that Republicans are rushing to get the repeal bill passed.
“They’re rushing this bill through. We know why they’re rushing this bill through. The more exposure it gets, the less popular it becomes,” he said.
He predicted that Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) will have “real difficulty” getting the Senate to pass the bill.
“His mainstream Republicans don’t like it because it cuts back on Medicaid,” Schumer said. “You have our conservative Republican senators who think this bill goes too far. So Senator McConnell has got a very, very difficult job ahead of him, and he only has the bill to blame.”
The non-partisan Congressional Budget Office estimated in a report released Monday that 24 million people would lose their insurance over the next 10 years under the repeal bill.
Schumer said the CBO report made it clear that “TrumpCare will cause serious harm to millions of American families.”
“Tens of millions will lose their coverage, and millions more, particularly seniors, will have to pay more for health care,” he said. “This should be a looming stop sign for the Republicans repeal effort.”
