McConnell rejects Trump’s advice to repeal ObamaCare now, replace later

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell is rejecting President Trump’s suggestion on how the Senate could promptly pass its ObamaCare overhaul measure — by immediately repealing the 2010 heath care law and replacing it later.

The Kentucky Republican said Friday night that the bill, which includes significant and complex changes to ObamaCare, remains challenging but “we are going to stick with that path.”

He also riffed on Trump’s winning campaign slogan, saying, “It’s not easy making America great again, is it?”

McConnell’s is struggling to bridge the divide between moderates and conservatives.

The president also tweeted his message shortly after Nebraska Republican Sen. Ben Sasse appeared on Fox News Channel’s “Fox & Friends” to talk about a letter he had sent to Trump making that exact suggestion: a vote on repealing former President Barack Obama’s health law followed by a new effort at a working out a replacement.

Trump is a known “Fox & Friends” viewer, but Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., also claimed credit for recommending the tactic to the president in a conversation earlier in the week.

“Sen. Rand Paul suggested this very idea to the president,” said Paul spokesman Sergio Gor. “The senator fully agrees that we must immediately repeal Obamacare and then work on replacing it right away.”

Either way, Trump’s suggestion has the potential to harden divisions within the GOP as conservatives like Paul and Sasse complain that McConnell’s bill does not go far enough in repealing former President Barack Obama’s health care law while moderates criticize it as overly harsh in kicking people off insurance rolls, shrinking the Medicaid safety net and increasing premiums for older Americans.

McConnell has been trying to strike deals with members of both factions in order to finalize a rewritten bill lawmakers can vote on when they return to the Capitol the second week of July.

Underscoring the fissures within the GOP, conservative group leaders on that call welcomed Trump’s suggestion but said it didn’t go far enough because it could open the door to a subsequent bipartisan compromise to replace Obama’s law. At the same time, a key House Republican, Rep. Kevin Brady, chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee, rejected Trump’s suggestion, contending that it “doesn’t achieve what President Trump set out to do.”

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