GOP delays healthcare vote until next month

Unable to reconcile differences, Republican leaders decided on Tuesday to delay a vote on their healthcare bill until after the July 4 recess. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., wanted to hold a vote on the newly released GOP Obamacare fix by Friday but scrapped the idea after meeting today with Senate Republicans and Vice President Mike Pence. Republicans can lose no more than two votes from their own conference to pass the legislation, and McConnell conceded there’s still too much disagreement to proceed. The Senate leaves town Friday and will not return to Washington until July 10. That gives Republicans just three weeks to complete healthcare negotiations and pass a bill before Congress takes its annual month-long August recess. As of Tuesday afternoon, six GOP senators say they will not vote for the legislation unless leaders make significant changes. President Donald Trump called most of those holdouts over the weekend and met with Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., one of the bill’s most vocal Republican critics, at the White House on Tuesday. Trump invited all Republican senators to the White House to discuss the bill later Tuesday afternoon. McConnell said the work to repeal and replace Obamacare is not dead: “We’re continuing to talk about it; it’s a very complicated subject.”

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