White House aide Kellyanne Conway said Monday that Republicans could repeal Obamacare without also replacing it, which would violate Trump’s prior pledge to do both at once.
“Very hopeful, very confident that the President can have the bill on his desk this summer,” Conway told “Fox & Friends.”
“In terms of the procedure,” she added later, “it could either be repealed and replaced at same time, or you could do what happened in the 2015 Senate bill, where every Republican senator who was there except for one voted, and they voted to immediately do away with the penalties and taxes under Obamacare, they dealt with Medicaid as well.”
“The only thing that’s changed since their vote in 2015 to repeal Obamacare and now is that you have a Republican president willing to sign that into law,” Conway said. “And you have the failures of Obamacare that much more crisp and obvious in front of you.”
Until Friday, Trump had pledged to repeal and replace Obamacare at the same time — as opposed to simply repealing it and charging lawmakers with crafting a replacement in a separate bill.
“I feel that repeal and replace have to be together,” the then President-elect said in January.
“It will be essentially simultaneously,” he said separately. “It will be various segments, you understand, but will most likely be on the same day or the same week, but probably the same day. Could be the same hour.”
But on Friday, Trump changed course.
If Republican Senators are unable to pass what they are working on now, they should immediately REPEAL, and then REPLACE at a later date!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) June 30, 2017
On Sunday, White House aide Mark Short said that, should Republicans not have the votes necessary to repeal and replace Obamacare all at once, they should “take care of the first step and repeal.”
Watch below via Fox News:
.@KellyannePolls is very hopeful that they can have the health care bill on his desk this summer. pic.twitter.com/eHdiQOedID
— Fox News (@FoxNews) July 3, 2017
“We are disgusted by Trump’s behavior while we support everything he wants.” GOP.
Rand Paul “That’s a really good idea. Let’s repeal ASAP, then we can see if we can find something to replace it with later < snicker >”
Kelly Ann’s been to the surgeon, I see. Tear troughs all plumped up.
Yes, well, in 2015 they all voted for it because they knew it would never become law. Now, when if they vote for it they will own it, they lack the same bravado. Sure, they can repeal the Affordable Care Act, but then they’ll have to answer to the American people, only about 10% of which want this to happen.
I don’t think they have the votes to do an out-and-out repeal, but even if they do, they don’t have the guts to pass a bill that repeals the ACA immediately.
Watch - they’ll propose one that repeals the ACA in 6 years. You know - after every Republican Senator has had their opportunity to get reelected.
EDIT: Yes, I’m aware that it’s going to take 60 votes to do a full repeal. I’m just saying that even if they had them, they still wouldn’t have the guts to make it happen right away. Save jobs first; kill people after reelection.