Senate Republicans met with Secretary of Health and Human Services Tom Price for lunch Wednesday, but lawmakers said that the discussion did not get into the details of an ObamaCare replacement plan.
President Trump said last month that his administration would put forward a replacement plan shortly after Price was confirmed, which happened last week. But it is unclear whether that plan is actually forthcoming. Some lawmakers said they think there will be more of a collaborative process between Congress and the White House.
There appeared to be little new ground covered in the meeting, as Republicans look to overcome divisions and find a way forward on ObamaCare.
{mosads}“It was really a reaffirmation of what we already knew,” said Sen. Mike Rounds (R-S.D.).
“We really talked in generality, he answered a lot of questions, invited us all to participate and all of us have a lot of different ideas, but I think that it’s beginning to gel,” Rounds added.
Sen. Shelley Moore Capito (R-W.Va.) said Price “didn’t get specific” about legislation.
Asked whether Congress or the White House would take the lead, Capito said, “He wants to work with us, and I’d say a little bit of both.”
Sen. Roger Wicker (R-Miss.), though, said that Republicans were trying to decide between a process led by a plan from the White House or a plan led by Congress.
“There are two schools of thought, one that a proposal needs to come down from the executive branch and that the Congress would then take that suggested piece of legislation and work on it and have hearings, go to conference and go at it that way,” Wicker said.
“The other school of thought is that House and Senate members, up to and including the Speaker and the leader, have worked hard on it, and that they should come out with their suggestions,” Wicker added. “So I think it’s fair to say that we’re at the point of deciding which approach to take.”
Price also discussed a proposed regulation that his department put forward Wednesday morning, aimed at stabilizing the ObamaCare marketplaces while the debate continues.
One of the thorniest issues for Republicans is what to do with ObamaCare’s expansion of Medicaid.
While lawmakers said the issue is still being worked on, Rounds said there is a recognition that states that expanded and that did not expand need to be treated equally. And he noted that it would be hard for a measure to pass if the expansion were simply scrapped, as some conservatives want.
“It was not so much a matter of keeping or ditching, it was a matter of how do you equalize treatment of the different states,” Rounds said.
Rounds said Price’s message in sum was that ObamaCare is on the “front burner.”
“They’re not forgetting about it, they’re not walking away from it, but they’re going to work with us to make sure that we have the votes necessary to get it across the finish line,” Rounds said.