“If the president refuses and instead vetoes this bill, our repeal is a marker for what a Republican Congress again will pass in 2017 under an administration that is willing to admit the harm done by Obamacare”, Johnson said. Republicans used budget reconciliation to push the legislation through the Senate 52-47.
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The bill will now be moved on to the House of Representatives, which passed another version of the legislation in October.
While they favor cutting off federal funds to Planned Parenthood, some conservatives said this week that another approach could be to let states exclude abortion providers like Planned Parenthood from Medicaid payments.
Planned Parenthood referenced the shooting spree its Colorado Springs clinic last week in blasting the Senate passage of the bill. The Senate measure strengthens companion legislation in the House to repeal the key pillars of Obamacare. No Democrats voted for it.
Collins, who felt the Republican-backed measure went too far, joined with Kirk and fellow moderate Lisa Murkowski of Alaska on Thursday to sponsor an amendment that would have preserved federal funding for Planned Parenthood organizations.
“Everyone knows this bill won’t become law”, Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nevada, said at a press conference Tuesday.
“The vote we took today is a significant step towards repealing every word of Obamacare”. These are big hits for congressional Republicans, who hate President Obama, hate women, hate the poor, and hate the idea of the government doing anything other than shooting guns at black and brown people.
The bill would defang the requirement that most Americans have health insurance or pay a fine. Obama said at the time that the law has helped tens of millions of Americans and is here to stay.
Thursday’s vote was a major event in the Senate, as Democrats never allowed a standalone vote on an ObamaCare repeal bill when they controlled the chamber. John Cornyn, Texas Republican, said.
In the Senate, Democrats and several liberal Republicans tried but failed to gut the language that defunds Planned Parenthood from the bill.
The health care law requires insurers to issue policies and set rates without regard to pre-existing health problems.
That it also removes penalties on individuals who do not buy insurance ostensibly helps the little people, but, hmmm, we should interrogate that a little. That would drive up premiums, prompting healthy policyholders to drop coverage, causing still more rate increases, the government contends.
This bill repeals as much of that failed law as we can under arcane Senate rules and the narrow guidelines of the budget, Cruz added. All three voted yes.
Under the bill, Planned Parenthood of Northern New England would not receive federal assistance for the 21 offices it operates in Vermont and New Hampshire, as well as in Biddeford, Sanford, Portland and Topsham. Jon Tester of Montana, who heads the Senate Democratic campaign committee, said of the GOP’s failure to propose an alternative.
“Defunding Planned Parenthood is nothing more than an attempt by some in Congress to pander to a fringe base”, Hirono said on the Senate floor Wednesday.
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“Collins has consistently opposed defunding Planned Parenthood because it provides important family planning, cancer screenings, and basic preventive health care services for millions of women across the country”, Clark said.
