Artist's rendering of Republican House members meeting to talk about Obamacare.
House Republicans will be meeting—for the first time—to hear what Rep. Paul Ryan's "working group" on a fix for Obamacare subsidies
has been "working" on for the past six months. Apparently up until today, it's been a secret from everyone.
"This will be a discussion on the progress the working group and leadership have made on a response plan," said Brendan Buck, a spokesman for Ways and Means Committee Chairman Paul Ryan (R-Wis.). "You should not expect a final plan to be released today."
It’s still a significant development, however. House Republicans have said they have a plan to insure Americans who rely on the subsidies that fuel the states using the federal health exchanges but have not unveiled a specific proposal.
Yes, it's very significant that seven months after the Supreme Court decided to hear this case, the majority party in the House of Representatives will meet to talk about possible outcomes. Yeesh. Of course there won't be a final plan released today, this is the first meeting! And since it's the first meeting, leadership can expect to get an earful from the rank and file tea partiers about exactly what they aren't going to accept. Getting final agreement today, much less ever, is too tall an order.
Beyond the news that this is the first time House Republicans are going to meet to talk about this, we learn that House Speaker John Boehner met with Republican Sens. Orrin Hatch (UT), John Cornyn (TX), and John Thune (SD). Now when senators talk about deals with the House they might not be lying. Of this meeting with Boehner, Cornyn just said: "We do have a number of contingency plans to make sure we protect the people who would be hurt if Obamacare is struck down yet again by the Supreme Court." (Note to Cornyn: the Supreme Court has never struck down Obamacare.)
