GOP Senate leader says he'll unveil new health bill Thursday
By alan fram and erica werner, associated press
WASHINGTON — Jul 11, 2017, 3:19 PM ET
Senate Republicans will unveil their revised health care bill Thursday and begin voting on it next week, Majority Leader Mitch McConnell said Tuesday. He said he would delay the chamber's August recess for two weeks as the GOP tries breaking logjams that have slowed work on that and other issues.
McConnell, R-Ky., described his plans to reporters as the prospects for the divided party's drive to repeal much of President Barack Obama's health care law seemed as gloomy as ever. Earlier, one Republican senator said he is "very pessimistic" that the health care measure will be approved, while another warned leaders about retaliation by conservative voters should they react to a collapse of the measure by striking a deal with Democrats.
Underscoring the uncertainty, No. 3 Senate GOP leader John Thune of South Dakota would not make predictions about the health care vote.
"I think we have narrowed it down to where we know where the decision points are," he said.
With at least a dozen Republicans opposing or challenging parts of McConnell's bill, the leader has been working on revisions aimed at bringing more GOP senators on board. These included how tightly to curb the growth of Medicaid, the health insurance program for the poor; whether to let insurers sell low-cost policies with very limited coverage; and how much money to devote to making health care tax credits more generous.
"I'm very pessimistic," Sen. Charles Grassley, R-Iowa, said on the Fox News Channel of the chances a bill will pass.
Grassley, first elected in 1980, said that Republicans have been promising for years to repeal Obama's 2010 statute and said, "There are consequences if you don't deliver on election promises, and there ought to be."
Over the weekend, Grassley tweeted that if Republicans don't complete a bill, "WE WILL GO FROM MAJORITY TO MINORITY."
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http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/wireStory/longtime-gop-senator-pessimistic-health-bill-prospects-48568592