Earlier this week the US Congress threatened to stall with House Representatives clashing along political lines. The Democrats were opposed to the spending bill put forward by the administration which stipulated that the US would finance part of the US-Mexico border. The vote was put forward to prevent a stalemate, and the same happened on Thursday night only this time, it concerned the Obamacare repeal act.
Obamacare has for a long time been a point of contention between the Republicans and Senates both in the Senate and in the House of Representatives. Now it is no longer just a problem for the two parties. More recently Republicans in both chambers have shown differing views on how the Obamacare act should be repealed, with conservatives and moderates having different views on the subject.
On Thursday night, House Republican leaders and whips met. The outcome of that meeting was that Republicans decided not to push for a vote for the bill’s reform on Friday. Leaders, however, stated that the reason was not that they did not believe that the bill could succeed. “We do not have the numbers for now,” House Majority Leader Rep. Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) said. “Gathering numbers takes time, and that is why we are postponing the vote. When we have the numbers, we will vote on it.”
The bill proposed to replace the ACA of 2010 was written by Rep. Mark Meadows (R-NC) and Rep. Tom McArthur (R-NJ). The bill proposes a total overhaul of the Medicaid that allowed millions of Americans to get insurance of under the Obamacare bill. Additionally, it offers larger tax credits to be issued to the ordinary Americans as per their age to enable them to afford insurance cover. The proposed law also stipulates that states be allowed to waive their fiscal responsibility in ensuring specific health cases. The dispute among the various parties regarding in the bill are main concerns that the new bill would leave many US citizens uninsured.
At the moment, proponents of the bill seem hopeful that time will change the minds of the current holdouts. That claim remains to be seen. The number of Republicans for the bill is lower than the required figure, and Democrats do not seem to be offering up any support either.
Though the House is still debating on the bill, members of the Senate also have their views on the matter. Senator Rand Paul opines that the McArthur-Meadows bill as of now is ‘taking money from the taxpayers and giving it to insurers’ so he is against it. A spokesperson for Senator Ted Cruz said that the Texan senator had expressed concern that the new bill would cheat many people out of their insurance covers ‘for no reason.’ He echoed sentiments of other senators who all remarked that the only way for the bill to be approved was for it to be reformed to compromise on Medicaid, improve tax credits and rework the state-by-state insurance waivers.
The move has been called out by many as a Republican move to replace a Democrat’s bill with a Republican one. However, some leaders such as Senator Lindsey Graham 9R-SC) are asking that the bill be bipartisan for the benefit of the ordinary American.