Mitch McConnell ran for re-election partly on the promise to repeal Obamacare "root and branch," with vague promises on what came next. That whole "replace" promise as been elusive to Republicans for five years, but now it's the first part, the repeal that's giving McConnell headaches.
GOP sources say Senate Parliamentarian Elizabeth MacDonough has raised red flags in response to queries about whether it’s possible to use a special budgetary procedure to repeal the controversial law “root and branch,” as Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) has said. Senate Republican officials have pushed for an interpretation of the rules that would allow for repealing the law with a one-sentence provision on a simple-majority vote. The special process is known as budgetary reconciliation. It can be used to circumvent the Senate’s customary 60-vote threshold to produce changes in spending and revenue. […] But sources say MacDonough, who declined to comment for this article, doesn’t agree.
That could change, if McConnell wants to really push repeal through on reconciliation. It would mean finding a parliamentarian who would go along with it. But it would also mean he would need all his Republicans, and some of his Republicans aren't going to have such easy re-election campaigns in 2016. Maybe a vote to take away everything that Obamacare has accomplished—like giving millions of people affordable health insurance—won't be something these folks would relish. Then there's the other side, with "Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) and Tea Party groups, including FreedomWorks and the Senate Conservatives Fund," pushing for McConnell to use this tool and make the vote happen. It's all moot for the time being, since President Obama would veto it regardless of what spending bill it was attached to, and Republicans would just end up—again—flirting with a government shutdown. McConnell is in a well-deserved bad spot, with just one escape hatch: a Supreme Court that might just do his dirty work for him.
