Here’s where things wound up last night on the Hill. More on the new version of the bill, released overnight, soon.
A very strange day in Washington as Republicans failed, as they have for seven years, to come up with a viable alternative to Obamacare.
The nugget that probably best captures the day came from the Congressional Budget Office. It assessed the most recent version of the bill and concluded that it will still take coverage away from 24 million people, just like the original version of the bill, but will cost an additional $186 billion to do so.
Let me say that again: The revised bill spends $186 billion more to not cover the same number of people. What a win!
Keep that in mind as the House proceeds to vote on an even newer version of the bill Friday, that still hasn’t been released, and that the CBO will not be given time to score in advance.
White House demands vote Friday on Obamacare repeal, come hell or high water. No CBO score. Still no bill! But from what we know if it, it’s an objectively terrible piece of legislation, whether you’re a purveyor of sane health care policy or a conservative looking for ideological purity. Ryan is going along with the Trump plan to ram it through. Do Republicans have the votes? Our latest dispatch after a long evening on the Hill.
The potentially historic vote to end Medicaid as we know it and repeal Obamacare was postponed today, in a devastating setback for Paul Ryan and Donald Trump. But we’re still closely monitoring the ongoing negotiations on the Hill this evening, with Tierney Sneed and Alice Ollstein on the ground.
Here’s a rough outline of what we’re expecting:
The CBO has re-scored the Obamacare repeal bill taking into account the so-called managers amendments.
Reports coming out that the vote on the House GOP’s Obamacare repeal vote will be postponed. Nothing official yet. But it’s looking mighty unrealistic that this is happening today. Here’s the latest from TPM’s Tierney Sneed.
Sen. Pat Roberts (R-KS) quickly apologizes for his crack about mammograms to TPM’s Alice Ollstein.
A few minutes ago, TPM’s Alice Ollstein asked Sen. Pat Roberts (R-KS) if he supports scrapping Obamacare’s 10 essential health benefits (more here on that). Roberts deadpanned: “I sure don’t want my mammogram benefits taken away.”
The very latest from our two reporters on the Hill about where things stand this morning on Obamacare repeal. Could be a very late night.
CNN digs in on what James Comey meant when he told Congress this week that the FBI is investigating whether there was “coordination” between the Trump campaign and Russia.