have been under political pressure<\/a> to coalesce around a plan ahead of the planned vote on the Democratic bill. Thune announced Tuesday that the Senate Republican conference had chosen a bill from Senate Finance Chairman Mike Crapo and Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Chairman Bill Cassidy.\n <\/p>\n\n The GOP bill expands health savings accounts for consumers to help pay for some ACA plans, but it does not extend the enhanced subsidies that Democrats are fighting to preserve. It also includes language that doesn\u2019t allow the funds to be used for gender-affirming care or abortions. Republicans say it gives money to patients, not insurance companies\u2019 bottom lines.\n <\/p>\n
\n \u201cOur members have decided that we\u2019re going to vote on a Crapo-Cassidy proposal,\u201d said Thune. \u201cSo that is an alternative that we will put forward, and we will have a vote on on Thursday, and we\u2019ll see where the Democrats come down on that.\u201d\n <\/p>\n
\n But asked Tuesday whether he thought Democrats would get on board with his proposal, Cassidy conceded, \u201cSo far, no.\u201d\n <\/p>\n
\n And a key Republican, Sen. Lisa Murkowski, also suggested the bill wouldn\u2019t get the needed backing from Democrats, telling reporters: \u201cI just don\u2019t think it\u2019s going to get 60. It doesn\u2019t deal with premiums.\u201d\n <\/p>\n
\n President Donald Trump told a reporter on Air Force One, \u201cI like the concept,\u201d when asked if he supports the bill.\n <\/p>\n
\n \u201cI love the idea of money going directly to the people, not to the insurance companies, going directly to the people,\u201d he said.\n <\/p>\n
\n Thune argued Republicans\u2019 proposal \u201cwill bring insurance premiums down, it will be fiscally responsible, and it\u2019ll get us away from the practice of giving the money all to the insurance companies and put it back in the hands of the patients.\u201d\n <\/p>\n
\n Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer made clear that the GOP health care plan that leadership will bring to the floor in a side-by-side vote along with the Democrats\u2019 proposal is a \u201cnonstarter\u201d and placed the blame squarely on Republicans for the enhanced tax credits expiring at the end of the month if no bipartisan deal is reached.\n <\/p>\n
\n \u201cWe\u2019re always willing to \u2026 negotiate with someone who will lower costs. Their bill was absolutely not lower costs,\u201d Schumer told reporters on Tuesday afternoon, moments after GOP leaders announced they would bring the bill from Cassidy and Crapo to the floor this week.\n <\/p>\n
\n \u201cThe Crapo-Cassidy bill would not extend the ACA tax credits for a single day. That\u2019s what\u2019s driving the price up, and they\u2019re doing nothing about it,\u201d Schumer said.\n <\/p>\n
\n Pressed on the likelihood that the ACA subsidies expire after both bills are both brought to the floor this week and fail to get 60 votes, Schumer acknowledged, \u201cYeah, and the burden is on 13 Republicans to vote with us.\u201d\n <\/p>\n
\n \u201cOurs is the only plan. Their plan would allow the tax credits to expire. In your own words, our plan would stop them from expiring. That\u2019s why it\u2019s supported overwhelmingly by the American people,\u201d he said.\n <\/p>\n
\n This story has been updated with additional details.\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Majority Leader John Thune announced that the Senate will vote Thursday on a Republican-led alternative to Democrats\u2019 three-year…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":335594,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[34],"tags":[49,48,84,392],"class_list":{"0":"post-335593","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-healthcare","8":"tag-ca","9":"tag-canada","10":"tag-health","11":"tag-healthcare"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/335593","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=335593"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/335593\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/335594"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=335593"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=335593"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=335593"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}