Louisiana House budget offer panned by Senate

After spending a month deliberating over a response to the House's passage of a bill to repeal the law, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) is accelerating the party's stagnant work as a jam-packed fall agenda confronts congressional leaders and President Donald Trump.

The House passed its version of the bill in May, but many GOP senators said that legislation could not be passed in the upper legislative chamber.

Elected pledging to overhaul the healthcare system and slash taxes, Trump has yet to notch a major legislative win, and time is running out before lawmakers leave Washington for August.

The meeting also involved a discussion of more divisive policy decisions.

"We want it to be revenue neutral, and we are still supportive of tax reform, but I am also saying to you that what we believe is most important to get the economy going is the tax cuts", he said.

"We're getting closer to bringing up a proposal that we can bring up in the near future", McConnell told reporters. At this point, Democrats are not expected to vote for any Senate bill that significantly modifies the ACA so Republicans must rely entirely on their own Conference. Ohio Republican Rob Portman and others such as Nevada's Dean Heller are pushing for a seven-year phaseout ending in 2027. "And I'm looking forward to seeing it - so looking forward to seeing it", Trump said flanked by the GOP leaders at a conference table.

Sen. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, one of the co-authors of the forthcoming bill, was a bit more candid about the mood of Republicans.

While Senate Republicans insist they are making progress on health care reform, they are not confident that they can meet the summer timeline being put forth by the White House.

Under Obamacare, the essential health benefit mandate forced health insurance companies to offer mandatory coverage for things like maternity services and mental health care.

No one can say with certainty what the finished Senate bill will look like - because it is a secret. On Wednesday, he met with families negatively affected by the Affordable Care Act, not long after Anthem announced it was pulling out of Ohio's insurance marketplace for 2018.

The crux of the legislative stalemate is the inability of Republicans to deliver on their health care promise.

Standing next to Biggs in the elevator after the HFC meeting, Rep. Ted Yoho (R-Fla.) agreed.

And even the White House is admitting that the ongoing investigation into whether Trump's team colluded with Russian Federation during the 2016 election is hampering any efforts at legislative achievements.

The House GOP offered Tuesday night to spend $50 million more than the House originally proposed, removing dollars the Senate proposed to spend on health services, public colleges, state prisons, state police and the child welfare agency in the 2017-18 budget year.

"We'll probably have a vote on a health care bill, but the chance of the House and the Senate reconciling our positions on health care is pretty limited". But the measure would not allow states to waive rules preventing people with pre-existing conditions from being charged more, a departure from the House-passed bill.

A growing number of insurers are leaving Obamacare markets or proposing steep premium increases next year, partly because of the law's weaknesses but also now because the Trump administration refuses to commit to steps to keep them operating, such as enforcing a penalty on people who don't get insurance and providing aid to low-income consumers. The House bill would eliminate enhanced federal funding for Medicaid expansion in 2020 and curtail support for the program overall. On the same day, the insurance giant Anthem announced it would stop offering policies in the OH marketplace under Obamacare.

If McConnell can not bridge the Medicaid divide, he may have to refocus efforts on more limited legislation to rescue insurance markets across the country that have been battered by the political turmoil in Washington.

That's created a series of tough choices, and resulted in difficulty in drafting legislation that's acceptable to Republican senators from states with diverse needs.