Despite making noises about issues with the bill, House Republicans on the Ways and Means Committee approved the Trumpcare bill the same day it reached their desks.
In Republican mythology, the Affordable Care Act was rushed through Congress in the middle of the night, with no one getting a chance to read it. In the real world, that bill took 402 days to reach President Obama’s desk. But this time Republicans are determined to match the myth, pressing Trumpcare forward without a single Democratic vote and despite problems acknowledged by both left and right.
Democrats did their best to delay the bill, forcing Republicans to read it as part of a 16 hour debate, and highlighted some of the bill’s worst features.
One item tucked into the GOP health care bill is a section that relaxes a provision in the Obama health law, which restricted how much health insurance companies could deduct on their taxes related to executive pay. Congressional tax experts testified that the provision will cost taxpayers $400 million over ten years – meaning that health insurers will pay about $40 million less in taxes annually.
Under Trumpcare, Americans will pay more so executives can deduct massive salaries. Is that what you voted for, Trump supporters? It didn’t matter to Republicans, who were determined to approve the bill before the ink had a chance to dry.
Also under debate Wednesday night was one particular section of Trumpcare that is clearly Trump care—as in, dollars for something about which Trump cares deeply.
Right after the debate on the tax change for insurance companies, the Ways and Means Committee moved into a debate over whether to repeal a tax on tanning bed businesses. Most people probably don’t remember that a 10 percent tax was levied by the Obama health law.
Trumpcare will make it possible for even more people to get skin cancer from tanning beds. That’s Donald Trump’s idea of a health benefit.
Despite conservatives making noise about not liking the bill, or about it being just some other form of “socialism,” every single Republican on the committee voted for the bill.
While Democrats pointed out that the bill would allow states to drop mental health coverage, Republicans didn’t care.
Republicans are concerned that the bill won’t kill all of the Affordable Care Act, but trying to do so would prevent the legislation from squeezing in as a “budget reconciliation” bill. That would mean Democrats got a chance to filibuster the bill in the Senate. Republicans aren’t having that. What they are having is a bill that consists of mostly tax breaks for wealthy executives and wealthy consumers at the expense of people who actually got covered under the ACA.
Despite claims that the bill offends their conservative sensibilities, it continues to be pushed forward at top speed. Republicans appear poised to continue to complain … and continue to vote for Trumpcare.