Top Republican Concedes Obamacare Repeal Unlikely

This post has been updated.

Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers (R-WA), the No. 4 Republican in the House, admitted that Obamacare is likely here to stay, despite House Republicans’ 50 votes to repeal the law.

“We need to look at reforming the exchanges,” she told the Spokesman-Review in an interview published Friday. She said that Republicans probably won’t be able to fully repeal the law, and should instead focus on other reforms within the current structure of Obamacare.

“It is a top-down, one-size-fits-all approach to health care,” McMorris Rodgers said, adding that she thinks consumers should have more choice within the exchanges.

She also said that the health care law’s Medicaid expansion is unsustainable.

“You’re seeing where they’ve had to reduce programs for the very people it’s meant to help,” she said. “Somebody’s going to have to pay the bill.”

McMorris Rodgers addressed immigration reform as well. She told the Spokesman-Review that a comprehensive bill could still be brought up in the House this year.

“I believe there is a path that we get a bill on the floor by August,” she said.

McMorris Rodgers’ office clarified her stance on Obamacare to TPM on Sunday, noting that she did not write the Spokesman-Review’s headline.

“As was made abundantly clear in the interview, the Congresswoman believes Obamacare’s government-centered, one-size fits all approach is not working, and will never work on multiple fronts, which is why she has voted numerous times to repeal it and will continue to work to repeal it at every opportunity,” spokesman Nate Hodson wrote in an email.

“Until the President and Democrats in Congress join Republicans in fully repealing this unworkable law, her mission is to continue protecting as many Americans as possible from its harmful effects until it is dismantled and replaced with needed reforms focused on patient-centered health care.”

[H/t Huffington Post]