ObamaCare’s GOP Preservers Seven Republicans pull a switcheroo as repeal fails, 45-55.
https://www.wsj.com/articles/obamacares-gop-preservers-1501110907
The Senate voted 45-55 Wednesday not to repeal ObamaCare with a two-year delay to replace it, and the only consolation for Republicans is the clarity of seeing who voted to preserve and protect rather than repeal and replace.
Congress had passed and sent to Barack Obama’s desk a similar measure in 2015, with support from every current Senate Republican except Susan Collins of Maine. This time seven voted no, including Rob Portman of Ohio and Shelley Moore Capito of West Virginia, who aren’t up for re-election until 2022 and 2020, respectively. If you’re going to renege on your political promises, better to do it early, we suppose.
The repeal failure follows a Tuesday vote in which nine Republicans defeated a package to replace parts of the law and rehabilitate Medicaid, which went down 43-57. Only three Republicans voted against both, or to maintain the undiluted status quo: Ms. Collins, Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, and Dean Heller of Nevada.
In 2015 Ms. Murkowski’s office put out an encomium to her many efforts to unwind ObamaCare, which she voted against in 2009. (See nearby.) Ms. Murkowski has co-sponsored bills to delay the individual mandate and to nix the law’s “Cadillac tax” on expensive plans. She bragged about her vote to eliminate the medical device tax and published op-eds on the “harmful impacts” of ObamaCare. This was apparently make-work for her staff.
Mr. Heller is the only Republican likely to have a tough re-election fight next year, and this week he made it that much tougher. The Nevadan voted Tuesday to allow debate, which Democrats will portray as a vote for repeal. But the GOP voters who helped him eke out a roughly 10,000-vote victory in 2012 will rightly judge the opposite from Wednesday’s vote. Don’t bet the fortune in the Vegas casinos or on a second Heller term.
Then there’s Rand Paul of Kentucky and Mike Lee of Utah, who voted for repeal and will soon be flaunting their self-styled reputations as the only political saints in Sin City. The reality is that their long refusal to vote for less-than-perfect repeal gave decisive leverage to Senate GOP moderates, who have combined to water down reform.
The practical effect will likely be to squander a historic opportunity to put Medicaid on a sustainable budget and better serve the truly needy rather than able-bodied adults. Can we at least no longer hear lectures from Mr. Paul of the kind he offered in January that we “can absolutely not balance a budget” without addressing entitlements?
The Senate is continuing to debate amendments in a crush of votes, and no one knows what will result. The most likely possibility is a “skinny repeal” that kills discrete features of ObamaCare like the employer and individual mandates and medical device tax. Moving even a “skinny bill” into a conference negotiation with the House is better than nothing, but it is light years from the bold Republican Senate promises of 2015-2016.
The best outcome of Wednesday’s repeal vote would have been to send the bill to a Republican President who is willing and even desperate to sign it. But at least voters have clarity about which GOP Senators are willing to ratify President Obama’s achievements.
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