Morning Briefing
Summaries of health policy coverage from major news organizations
The Death Knell Came With McCain's Thumbs Down, But The Path To Failure Was Quite Long
The New York Times: Behind Legislative Collapse: An Angry Vow Fizzles For Lack Of A Viable Plan
The closing argument was a curious one: Vote yes, Republican leaders told the holdouts in their conference. We promise it will never become law. After seven years of railing against the evils of the Affordable Care Act, the party had winnowed its hopes of dismantling it down to a menu of options to appease recalcitrant lawmakers — with no more pretenses of lofty policy making, only a realpolitik plea to keep the legislation churning through the Capitol by voting to advance something, anything. They ended up with nothing. (Flegenheimer, Martin and Steinhauer, 7/28)
The New York Times: How Schumer Held Democrats Together Through A Health Care Maelstrom
Over the past week, as Senate Republicans feverishly cobbled together their doomed health care bill, Chuck Schumer, the Democratic leader, made several quiet visits to the private “hideaway” office of John McCain, Republican of Arizona, near the Senate chamber on the Capitol’s first floor. Senator McCain, who recently received a brain cancer diagnosis, was nervous about the bill, which he thought would harm people in his state, and elegiac about members of his storied family, reminiscing about them at some length. (Steinhauer, 7/29)
Politico: How Republicans Got Stuck On Repeal
Republicans openly speculated in November whether they could fast-track an Obamacare repeal bill to Donald Trump's desk by Inauguration Day or whether they might need just a few days longer. But Congress got stuck. Its last-ditch attempt to pass a "skinny" bill to kill a few pieces of the health law — many of which Trump could have abolished himself with an executive order — collapsed. (Haberkorn, 7/31)
The Associated Press: Leaders In McCain's Home State Frustrated By Repeal Failure
Sen. John McCain sent shockwaves through the Senate early Friday morning when he cast the deciding vote rejecting the GOP's heath care effort to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act. While his dramatic thumbs-down rejection drew gasps and cheers in Washington, D.C., leaders in Arizona have responded with a mixture of disappointment and frustration — but little in the way of direct criticism in this Republican-heavy state. (7/28)
USA Today/Arizona Republic: What Ducey Told McCain Ahead Of His Big Vote To Kill GOP 'Repeal' Bill
Throughout U.S. Senate deliberations over a proposed repeal of the Affordable Care Act, Sen. John McCain repeatedly invoked the name of Gov. Doug Ducey, saying he wanted to ensure any new law didn't punish their home state of Arizona. "My position on this proposal will be largely guided by Governor Ducey's analysis of how it would impact the people of our state," McCain, R-Ariz., said Thursday during a news conference hours before the late night vote in which he would give a thumbs down to the Senate GOP's so-called "skinny repeal" bill. (Nowicki and Sanchez, 7/30)
Politico Pro: The New Rules Of Health Reform
The dark-of-night drama that abruptly halted Republicans' troubled Obamacare repeal for now was a fitting end to an irregular process that was surprising from the start. But veterans of previous health care reforms also acknowledge that the norm-shattering strategy was vanishingly close to success. (Diamond, 7/28)
The Associated Press: Only A Cat Seems To Have More Lives Than 'Obamacare'
The Senate's surprise vote was only the latest narrow escape for "Obamacare," the social program with nine lives that has survived dozens of congressional attempts to kill it, and two Supreme Court challenges. Not to mention the massive computer crash when HealthCare.gov was launched. (7/29)
