These debates are purely academic, since President Obama will undoubtedly veto any bill that repeals large portions of his most notable domestic policy. “Women, men, and young people deserve to be able to access reproductive health care free from violence, threats, or intimidation, and we’ll make sure they can get the care they need and deserve”.
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Senators voted 54-46 to set aside an amendment to the Obamacare repeal bill that would remove a provision that defunds 80 percent of Planned Parenthood’s federal funding for a year and reallocates the funds to other healthcare centers. Fortunately, President Obama is expected to veto any bill that aims to defund the nonprofit, which has been his stance since the beginning.
Hoping to make Mr. Obama squirm a bit as he picks up his pen, Republicans argued sweeping wins in the 2014 mid-terms gave them a mandate to crusade against the health-care law, which they’ve blamed for rising premiums, narrow doctor networks and a host of other ills.
Now is not the time to pull support (funding and otherwise) for Planned Parenthood. “An estimated 17.6 million Americans gained coverage…The (bill) would roll back coverage gains and cost millions of hard-working middle-class families the security of affordable health coverage they deserve”.
Republicans have been vowing to repeal and replace Obamacare for more than five years, voting dozens of times to dismantle key aspects of the law.
Although the amendments wouldn’t become law, Democrats hope to force a vote to target vulnerable Republicans on those issues in the 2016 elections.
The second amendment, offered by Sen.
The utility of these bills for Republicans “is that they are actually doing things the base wants them to do”, says Jennifer Duffy of the independent Cook Political Report. “Do they meet with them?”
The Senate’s beefed-up version would phase out the law’s exchange subsidies for private plans and the expansion of Medicaid in select states.
Kirk and Collins were the only Republicans to vote against the final legislation.
As for Medicaid, which has been popular in OH after Republican Gov. John Kasich, a presidential candidate, chose to accept the expansion, Portman pointed to the two-year delay and said it would be untruthful for Democrats to accuse him of taking away health care.
Fellow Republicans defeated the measure, 52-48, although Mrs. Murkowski still voted for the overall package.
That’ll be symbolic – they won’t have the votes to override an inevitable veto – but it’s been a long road to get even this far. Senators rejected two separate amendments to strip out that language.
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Even before the vote occurred, Democratic operatives seized on it as evidence that the GOP-led Congress is too extreme. Joe Manchin, D-West Virginia and Sen. Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.), announced Thursday that they would be forcing votes on measures such as universal background checks, just one day after 14 people died in a massacre in Southern California.
