Overnight Healthcare: Trump plays hardball on ObamaCare | Senators revive negotiations | CBO says repeal without replace would cost 32M insurance

by Rachel Roubein and Jessie Hellmann - 07/19/17 6:21 PM ET

Senate GOP revives negotiation over ObamaCare repeal and replace

Senate Republicans will huddle on Wednesday evening to look for a way forward on GOP healthcare legislation.

“I think yeah, I would say that it is contemporarily sort of revived,” Sen. John Thune (R-S.D.) said of the Republican effort to repeal and replace ObamaCare.

Thune and Sen. Roy Blunt (R-Mo.), both members of Senate leadership, expressed optimism about injecting new life into the process following a closed-door lunch with President Trump earlier in the day. It is not clear what approach Senate Republicans will take in the negotiation.

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More on the meeting at the White House… Trump plays hardball

President Trump on Wednesday admonished Republican senators over their stalled healthcare push and demanded they resume work on a bill to repeal and replace ObamaCare, setting up a last-ditch attempt to avoid an embarrassing defeat.

Trump invited Republican senators to the White House for lunch a day after their healthcare legislation appeared dead, telling lawmakers they should not leave Washington before reaching a solution, even if it means scrapping their already-delayed August recess.

“Frankly, I don’t think we should leave town unless we have a health insurance plan,” the president said at the start of the lunch in the State Dining Room. “Because we’re close; we’re very close.”

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McConnell says he’ll try again

The president’s public tongue-lashing appeared to produce results.

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Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) said after the meeting that he would be reviving ObamaCare repeal and replace negotiations.

“Next week we’ll be voting on the motion to proceed, and I have every expectation that we’ll be able to get on the bill,” McConnell told reporters after the lunch with Trump.

It was not immediately clear which bill McConnell wanted to move to — a straight repeal of ObamaCare or the Senate’s ObamaCare repeal-and-replace legislation, which had seemed dead days ago.

But as the afternoon waned on, it seemed increasingly clear that McConnell’s hope is to get back to a new and improved Senate bill.

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Inside the lunch… Trump squeezes ‘no’ vote Heller

President Trump sat next to Sen. Dean Heller (R-Nev.), an opponent of the Senate GOP’s bill to repeal and replace ObamaCare, at the White House lunch designed to salvage the effort.

Trump used the seating arrangement to pressure Heller, joking about him wanting to “remain a senator.”

“Any senator who votes against debate says you are fine with ObamaCare,” Trump said.

Heller, considered one of the GOP’s most endangered 2018 incumbents, has a fraught relationship with the White House over his stance on healthcare.

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Trump also encouraged senators to cancel their recess to finish up their healthcare work.

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ObamaCare payments to continue

Key ObamaCare subsidies to insurers will be paid this month, the White House confirmed to The Hill on Wednesday, one day before the deadline to make July’s cost-sharing reduction (CSR) payments.

The administration has not made a commitment beyond this month.

The payments help low-income people afford the co-pays, deductibles and other out-of-pocket costs associated with health insurance policies. Insurers have called the payments critical, saying that without them, they would have to massively increase premiums or exit the individual market.

With Senate Republicans scrambling to find a path forward after their ObamaCare repeal-and-replace effort appeared to collapse this week, ending the CSR payments would be a major power play from the administration.

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White House working with moderates on new Medicaid proposal

Seema Verma, the administrator of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, told moderate GOP senators at a White House meeting Wednesday that the administration is willing to hammer out a new Medicaid proposal.

The latest proposal, which senators are calling a “Medicaid wrap-around,” would give states more flexibility to use Medicaid funding to cover the healthcare expenses of people outside the program who face high healthcare costs.

“She explained very briefly — very, very briefly — some of the parameters of what they’re calling this wrap-around for Medicaid,” said Sen. Lisa Murkowksi (R-Alaska), one of the moderate holdouts who has threatened to vote against a motion to proceed to the GOP’s healthcare bill.

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Freedom Caucus to try to force ObamaCare repeal vote

Members of the House Freedom Caucus will try to force a vote on legislation repealing ObamaCare, which the GOP-controlled Congress previously passed under President Obama.

Freedom Caucus members have been pushing for a straight repeal of the healthcare law since efforts to repeal-and-replace came to a halt in the Senate this week.

Rep. Tom Garrett (R-Va.) filed a special rule on Wednesday to start the process of triggering a vote, a GOP aide said. The measure will have to wait at the House Rules Committee for at least a week, meaning any vote wouldn’t be until after the August break.

Read more here.

What we’re reading

Mulvaney to insurers on Trump plans if health bill fails: ‘You probably won’t like it that much’ (IJR)

Uncertainty over ObamaCare leaves next year’s rates in limbo (NPR)

The myth of drug expiration dates (Propublica)

State by state

Pennsylvania mothers whose children rely on Medicaid keep up the pressure (Philly.com)

Advocates warn Iowa Medicaid privatization could cause a dentist shortage (Des Moines Register)

Missouri becomes last state to create drug-monitoring plan (Associated Press)

In case you missed it from The Hill

Trump: Republicans ‘never discuss how good their healthcare bill is’

Club for Growth ramps up pressure ahead of ObamaCare vote