Facing opposition from every health care organization, bipartisan opposition in the Senate and overwhelming opposition from the American people, Senate Republicans abandoned their latest health care repeal scheme today, known as Graham-Cassidy-Heller. This is at least the fifth attempt in 2017 at health care repeal by Republicans in Congress without any bipartisan or public support. Every version of health care repeal would have raised premiums, resulted in millions of people without coverage, allowed insurance companies to gut protections for people with pre-existing conditions, re-implement lifetime limits and charge an age tax, and ended Medicaid as we know it.
In response, Protect Our Care Campaign Director Brad Woodhouse issued the following statement:
“None of these health care repeal bills were ever about health care, they were about political wins for the Republican Congress and President Trump,” Woodhouse said. “No matter how hard they try to repeal our health care, the American people keep winning. Make no mistake, though, too many Republicans in Congress refuse to move on and are already promising to revive zombie repeal. The American people must remain vigilant.
“It’s past time for Republicans to abandon partisan repeal, stand up to President Trump’s sabotage of our health care system and work across party lines to improve our health care system. Senators Alexander and Murray had started that important work and it’s the path we need to take now.
“The Trump Administration and Republican leaders face a fork in the road — will they continue to be the party of partisan health care repeal and sabotage? Everyone is watching.”