Senate Republicans are poised to take the first step to repeal and replace President Barack Obama’s landmark healthcare law by approving a budget blueprint that they’ve dubbed the Obamacare “repeal resolution.”
But first, a political spectacle known as “vote-a-rama” is unfolding on the Senate floor.
The largely symbolic exercise — which began Wednesday evening and could stretch into the wee hours of Thursday — is ripe for theater.
Democrats are using the late-night drill to publicly defend the Affordable Care Act and chastise their colleagues across the aisle for starting the process of overhauling a law that gives health insurance to some 20 million Americans. Republicans, meanwhile, are stressing the harmful impact of the law and the urgent need to do away with it.
Senators have introduced more than 160 amendments to the budget resolution and started a marathon session of impassioned speeches and roll call votes. While these votes are non-binding and the budget resolution doesn’t require the president’s signature, the process will help crystallize the Democratic Party’s top priorities as it looks to defend the major pillars of Obamacare.
Top priority amendments for Democrats were aimed at preserving what they argue are popular provisions of Obamacare.
Democratic Sen. Tammy Baldwin of Wisconsin pressed a measure to allow young adults to stay on their parents insurance until age 26.
“It will block Republican efforts that would weaken dependent coverage,” Baldwin said in a brief but forceful floor speech before the vote.
But Republicans — many of whom have expressed interest in maintaining the provision when they eventually replace Obamacare — nevertheless blocked the Baldwin amendment, arguing it wasn’t applicable to the underlying budget resolution.
Democrats also pushed measures to keep in place provisions dealing with pre-existing conditions and reproductive health care services for women.
At times, the evening also showed that Republicans and Democrats share some common goals — even if the two political parties are bitterly divided on the merits of Obamacare.
Earlier in the night, West Virginia Sen. Joe Machin, a moderate Democrat who have called on Republicans to work in a bipartisan fashion on repealing and replacing Obamacare, emphasized the importance of preserving coverage for patients in rural areas.
No matter what happens to Obamacare, Manchin said: “We are going to make sure that we protect our rural hospitals and rural clinics.”
But on the same topic, GOP Sen. John Barrasso of Wyoming argued that it was because of Obamacare that rural hospitals have shuttered.
“For people in small towns — the closures that we’ve already experienced, these closures have had a devastating impact,” Barrasso said.
After the last amendment is voted on, the Senate will take a final vote on the budget resolution, which Republicans introduced for the sole purpose of kicking off the process of repealing Obamacare.
President-elect Donald Trump has ratcheted up the pressure, calling on his party to act as quickly as possible. Perhaps more significantly, Trump is adamant that Republicans vote on repealing and replacing Obamacare more or less at the same time. This is a significant divergence from the party’s initial thinking that it would first vote on repeal before considering replacement options.
In a news conference in Wednesday, Trump told reporters that a plan will be unveiled soon after his nominee for Health and Human Services secretary, Tom Price, is confirmed. A Georgia congressman, Price is an ardent Obamacare critic and has previously introduced detailed legislation to repeal and replace the law.
“We’re going to be submitting — as soon as our secretary’s approved, almost simultaneously, shortly thereafter, a plan. It’ll be repeal and replace. It will be essentially simultaneously,” Trump said. “Probably the same day, could be the same hour.”
Trump appeared to be suggesting that the plan would come from his administration, but a transition spokesman told CNN that he couldn’t confirm whether that was Trump’s intention.
Later this week, the House is expected take a swift vote on the resolution, possibly as early as Friday. But it still be weeks before there is an actual vote on repeal.
Several congressional committees will start crafting a budget reconciliation bill that carries the language to roll back major parts of Obamacare.
GOP leaders tentatively expect the House and Senate vote on that repeal reconciliation bill around late February or March, although the timing is still in flux.
But Republicans do not yet have a plan for replacing Obamacare, and are considering a series of possible legislative paths to replace what they vote to repeal.
It’s also not clear that one comprehensive “replacement” bill will ultimately emerge from GOP lawmakers — in fact, senior leaders are currently weighing the option of incremental replacement bills.
For example, they are exploring whether replacement measures could be inserted into the “repeal” reconciliation bill. Leaders are also looking into whether any replacement or healthcare reform measures could be inserted into reauthorization bills that Congress is expected to take up later this year.