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The best indicator that Senate Majority Leader is getting his Trumpcare deal, getting the 50 votes he needs to repeal Obamacare, is that Sen. Dean Heller (R-NV) is ready to cave on a slower destruction of Medicaid. Thursday afternoon, he told reporters "I support seven, I support seven," meaning that he'll support ending the Medicaid expansion in his state, but in seven years instead of three.
But what happened after that admission from Heller tells you how controversial that decision is for the Republicans’ most vulnerable incumbent in 2018. Immediately after Heller made that commitment on the bill, his staff tried to deny it.
When asked to either confirm or clarify what the senator told reporters at the Capitol, Heller spokesperson Megan Taylor asked if the Reno Gazette-Journal was “really doing a story on a false narrative the Democrats are pushing?”
She did not respond to questions about what information she considered was coming from Democrats, whether that be the report in The Hill or the senator’s own words.
She also declined to confirm if the senator said he was fine with a seven-year phase out of the program's expansion, which is being pushed by other Republican senators.
“Senator Heller has been working to ensure whatever health care bill is drafted in the Senate works for Medicaid expansion states,” Taylor said in an email statement. “This is just one of many policy options that is being discussed along with additional transition relief (i.e. growth rates) to ensure that the rug is not pulled out from underneath Nevadans and the more than 200,000 Nevadans who received insurance for the first time under Medicaid expansion.”
Is the Heller team dumb enough to think that the local paper doesn't have access to national media reports? Apparently they thought they'd give it a shot, anyway. But because this attempt was so blatantly awful, Taylor had to come back Friday morning with a clarification, of sorts, telling the Gazette-Journal "that he supported a seven-year phase out of the Medicaid expansion, but added his comments come in the middle of a negotiation that’s still ongoing."
What the fact that he made the comments in the middle of the negotiations has nothing to do with anything here. What is important here is that Heller is signing off on ending the coverage of 320,000 people. They're not going to be thanking him for doing it in seven years versus three years when it's gone. Which is precisely why he had his staff go out and back-pedal.
If you live in Nevada contact Heller via social media and call his D.C. office at (202) 224-6244. If you can't get through there, call or visit his Nevada offices—702-388-6605 in Las Vegas and 775-686-5770 in Reno. Don't let him off the hook.