Republican ObamaCare Replacement Collapses

The "replace" part of the Republican effort to repeal and replace ObamaCare collapsed Monday night, leaving the GOP in disarray. After Sens. Mike Lee and Jerry Moran announced that they would not support the ObamaCare repeal bill currently before the Senate, leaving the GOP without enough votes to even begin debate, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell admitted that the effort was doomed, Politico reports. Sens. Rand Paul and Susan Collins had already declared their opposition to the revamped version of the legislation. "It is now apparent that the effort to repeal and immediately replace the failure of ObamaCare will not be successful," McConnell said.

Republicans are now expected to focus on repealing ObamaCare first and replacing it later. "Republicans should just REPEAL failing ObamaCare now & work on a new Healthcare Plan that will start from a clean slate," President Trump tweeted, adding: "Dems will join in!" McConnell said he would seek a vote "in the coming days" on a repeal-only effort that passed the House and Senate in 2015 before being vetoed by then-President Obama, NBC reports. It is far from clear whether that bill will now have enough Republican votes to pass. Conservatives called for "clean repeal" Monday, while others called for working with Democrats on a new replacement, the Hill reports. (More ObamaCare stories.)