Do words have meaning?
Secretary of Health and Human Services Tom Price appeared on CNN yesterday morning where he said he and Trump are both committed to providing "insurance for everybody."
"Given the fact that the President promised insurance for everyone, how do you justify to the millions of voters who believed President Trump that there would be insurance for everyone when there clearly is not going to be?" Tapper asked.
"The President is committed to that, as am I," Price said. "The fact of the matter is, this bill that's moving through Congress right now is simply the first step in this process."
The Congressional Budget Office's (CBO) estimation that 24 million people would lose their coverage under Trumpcare will soon need to be revised upward because House Republicans are reportedly considering amending their bill to introduce block-grants and work requirements for Medicaid. They're expected to vote on these provisions this week before the CBO releases a new score which will almost certainly be apocalyptic.
We've seen only vague hints of what Republicans want to do next in their "three-pronged approach," but suffice to say none it will make up for cutting nearly a trillion dollars in spending on healthcare. Moreover, the next measures they consider cannot be passed through reconciliation and will be subject to filibusters from the right and left.
A man who knows all about filibusters, Ted Cruz, appeared on CBS yesterday morning where he mocked Paul Ryan's approach.
CRUZ: That ain’t going to happen.
It’s their so-called three bucket solution, which is all the good stuff is in bucket three? Bucket three takes eight Democrats. Right now, Senate Democrats are opposing everything. You can’t get eight Senate Democrats to agree on saying good morning.
Anything in bucket three -- I have called bucket three the sucker’s bucket. And what I have been urging the president and the administration and leader in both houses, take everything in bucket three, put it in bucket one. We have got to actually fix this problem.
There's a fairly good chance House Republicans will pass their farcical bill this week, but it's dead on arrival in the Senate.