That whole repeal immediately, replace later thing—not going so well for Republicans. Paul Ryan admitted as much Tuesday morning, writes The Hill:
“It is our goal to bring it all together concurrently,” Ryan told reporters after meeting with House Republicans behind closed doors.
“We’re going to use every tool at our disposal through legislation, through regulation, to bring replace concurrent along with repeal, so that we can save people from this mess.”
In the GOP conference meeting, Ryan told his colleagues he expects the House will press forward and vote Friday on a Senate-passed budget that will start the process to repeal the Affordable Care Act. That’s despite calls from Freedom Caucus members for more details about how the repeal and replacement process would unfold.
Right, so Obamacare is such a “mess” that Republicans now can’t repeal it without a replacement? Naturally, he offered no details about replacement and called it a “Senate question.”
Ryan's Tuesday morning pronouncement comes after a chorus of Senate Republicans have voiced concerns that repealing the healthcare law without a replacement for the 20 million Americans insured by it would be reckless.
Sounds like someone's been hearing from their constituents.
Sen. Bob Corker warned fellow Republicans that it would be "problematic," "not very appealing" and "doesn't seem very intelligent" to repeal the law without a replacement. [...]
Wisconsin Sen. Ron Johnson told CNN Monday: "I want to see the game plan in terms of how you actually enact replacement."
"I take (Senate Minority Leader Chuck) Schumer at his word that if we just go ahead and repeal, Democrats won't provide one vote for enacting the replacement," he said.
When Ron Johnson wants to see a "game plan," things are going very badly.
Sen. Rand Paul reportedly plans to unveil some sort of replacement scheme in the coming days.
Remember, once Republicans repeal health care using budget reconciliation (which only takes 50 votes), it's all theirs. They'll need 60 votes (i.e. Democratic help) to pass a replacement.