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Democrats try to co-opt GOP’s anti-Obamacare strategy: As Republicans gallop toward bringing a healthcare bill to the Senate floor, Democrats are beginning to co-opt a strategy Republicans employed against them to deadly effect – assailing the ugly and opaque process used to pass legislation. In 2010, Republicans campaigned on the fact that in stark contrast to candidate Barack Obama’s pledges to have a wide-open healthcare process, with negotiations broadcast on C-SPAN, much of the major deal making was occurring behind closed doors among a handful of key Senators and special interest groups. It was a potent attack not only because the impression that Democrats rammed through a massive re-write of one-sixth of the nation’s economy fired up the GOP base, but also because it allowed Republicans to make a less ideological case to independent voters. The process-based attacks played a central role in Scott Brown’s victory in the January 2010 U.S. Senate special election to replace the deceased liberal stalwart Ted Kennedy in Massachusetts, a state that Obama had carried by 26 points just over a year earlier. It went on to be at the core of Republican attacks when they took over the House 2010, and remained a central part of their critique of Obamacare. Now that Republicans are in charge they are choosing an even more rapid and secretive process. Whereas Democrats were criticized for mostly symbolic committee hearings in which one Republican amendment after another was voted down, while the real work went on behind the scenes, Republicans have gone further. Right now, a bill is being written, but many key Senators are saying they haven’t seen it – and it isn’t even clear who is writing it. All indications are that once the bill emerges and gets a score from the Congressional Budget Office, it will be brought to the floor for a vote, bypassing the committee process and severely limiting debate.
Democrats are now seizing on the opportunity to highlight the secretive process. On Monday, Democrats have indicated they want to hold the floor until at least midnight with speeches aimed at assailing the Republican healthcare efforts. According to a senior Democratic aide, a number of Senators plan to make a series of unanimous consent requests to attempt to force the House-passed healthcare bill to committee and make parliamentary inquiries attempting to push the idea that they pursued a more open and transparent process in passing Obamacare. Last week, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer trolled Republicans by inviting them to an “all Senators” meeting to discuss healthcare policy in the Old Senate chamber. On Monday morning, Senate Democrats followed up with a letter containing a long list of committee rooms where Republicans could hold hearings on their healthcare bill. Tactics such as these are another way of trying to assuage an angry base of voters that they are doing something to confront the GOP. There is a hunger among liberals for all out war with Republicans and the Trump agenda, but the reality is that Democrats can’t do much to do given that Republicans can pass legislation on a strict party-line vote. So they’re likely to ramp up attacks to create the impression that they’re pulling out all the stops.
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Supreme Court hands pharma a win on injuries case: The Supreme Court hampered where patients can sue drugmakers to get compensation for being harmed by their products. The court ruled 8-1 Monday in a case of a lawsuit against drug maker Bristol-Myers Squibb. A group of more than 600 people sued Bristol-Myers in California state court even though most of the plaintiffs aren’t California residents. The lawsuit was over whether the drug Plavix damaged their health. Plavix was not made in California and Bristol-Myers is based in New York. The court ruled that the California court doesn’t have specific jurisdiction to hear the case.
Insurers flying blind ahead of key Obamacare deadline: Health insurers face a Wednesday deadline for submitting Obamacare plans for 2018, but are still struggling with how to proceed in light of ongoing efforts in Congress to repeal the law and questions about whether the Trump administration will continue to pay out insurer subsidies. With that uncertainty unlikely to clear up by Wednesday, insurers will have to take an educated guess as to whether they want to participate in Obamacare next year, experts say. And while the deadline could be extended, that would only create new questions about whether they would be ready by the Obamacare open enrollment start date in the fall, one expert said. One way some insurers have gotten around the problem is by filing two sets of rates: one reflecting rates if Obamacare stays as is in 2018 and another reflecting higher rates if the cost-sharing reduction payments or law’s individual mandate are eliminated.
Did Obamacare’s individual mandate work? Experts disagree about the extent to which the provision did what it was intended to do: Get more people to purchase health insurance who otherwise wouldn’t. The divisions on the issue were apparent in a recent report published by the office of the actuaries at the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services. The report projected that the American Health Care Act, the House-passed bill to repeal and replace portions of Obamacare, would result in 4 million more people choosing to be uninsured because the mandate would be repealed. The results differed sharply from an earlier report from the Congressional Budget Office, which projected that roughly 14 million people would make that choice when given the option. “I think this is one of the places where researchers disagree,” said Douglas Holtz-Eakin, a former CBO director who is now president of the conservative American Action Forum, and said he doesn’t view the mandate as being incredibly effective. Read more.
American Hospital Association urges Senate to make changes to American Health Care Act: In a letter sent Monday, the group, which represents more than 5,000 facilities, urged the Senate to reject changes to the Medicaid structure and to seek out more generous provisions for tax credits. AHA said it opposes policies that would increase the number of people who are uninsured. If a healthcare bill does that, the group said, then payments should go to hospitals to make up for the services they provide.
More GOP senators decry healthcare bill process: More Republicans are criticizing GOP leadership’s efforts on crafting a healthcare reform bill behind closed doors. Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, a key centrist vote, criticized the process in comments to the Portland Press-Herald Friday. She said she would not vote for the bill that doesn’t have a score from the Congressional Budget Office. However, the criticism appears moot as the GOP has to get a CBO score to pass the bill via reconciliation. The pathway lets a bill get passed in the Senate by 51 votes but only if it reduces the deficit and focuses on budget and spending levels. The GOP needs a CBO score to show that the bill does that. Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., meanwhile, said he doesn’t want the bill to be too rushed. “The Senate is not a place where you can just cook up something behind closed doors and rush it for a vote,” he said according to the Associated Press. Rubio and Collins’ criticisms come on the heels of other Republicans miffed about the process. For instance, another key centrist Lisa Murkowski of Alaska said she doesn’t know what is in the bill yet and has called for the Senate to move the bill through the committee process when it is drafted.
Group runs ad of child having child asthma attack ahead of Senate vote on healthcare bill: The Community Catalyst Action Fund said Sunday it is launching a seven-figure radio and television advertising campaign on Monday targeting Republican senators in Alaska, Arizona, Maine, Nevada and West Virginia. A television ad targeting Maine GOP Sen. Susan Collins, for example, begins with a young boy with asthma sitting on a bed, having a hard time breathing. His mother rushes for an inhaler. “When this happens, she isn’t thinking about the healthcare bill in Congress,” the narrator says. “She isn’t thinking that it will force her to choose between filling his prescriptions or paying their mortgage. She isn’t thinking that when her premiums go up, they’ll lose their health insurance. And she shouldn’t have to.” It ends: “But you should Sen. Collins. So when you vote on the new healthcare bill, think about what’s right for Maine. And vote no.”
Medicaid expansion looms over opioid meeting: Some members of the new opioid panel, which had its inaugural meeting Friday, noted that any repeal of Medicaid’s expansion would spell serious trouble for fighting opioid abuse, which federal data shows kills 62 people a day. “We have to mention the fact that any repeal of Medicaid is a repeal of coverage we currently have out there,” said Patrick J. Kennedy, a former Democratic member of Congress who is now a mental health advocate. The White House’s opioid commission discussed with experts how to battle the opioid epidemic. The panel is expected to issue a final report with recommendations by Oct. 1. One expert pointed to the GOP congressional effort to roll back Obamacare’s Medicaid expansion as part of its larger repeal effort. “Medicaid is the largest national payer for addiction and mental health treatment. Medicaid must continue as an entitlement,” said Dr. Joseph Parks, medical director for the National Council for Behavioral Health, one of the experts the panel invited. “The Medicaid expansion must be maintained and completed.”
Nevada governor vetoes “Medicaid-for-all” bill. The bill would have allowed people to buy into the state’s Medicaid program regardless of income. If passed, Nevada would have been the first state to open the program to all residents. Republican Gov. Brian Sandoval, who is in favor of keeping Obamacare’s Medicaid expansion, said in his veto statement that it was unclear how the provision would work and that it would have “added more uncertainty to an industry that needs less.” He praised the sponsor of the bill for his “creativity.”
Six members of Trump’s HIV/AIDS advisory council resign because he ‘does not care’: “As advocates for people living with HIV, we have dedicated our lives to combating this disease and no longer feel we can do so effectively within the confines of an advisory body to a president who simply does not care,” Scott Schoettes, a member who resigned wrote in an op-ed for Newsweek. Schoettes explained that the decision to resign from PACHA was not one he nor any of his colleagues took lightly. However, he stressed that they could not stand by and watch President Trump regress health policies that enable people living with HIV/AIDS the “life-saving medications” they need.
Stephen Colbert: GOP healthcare bill like new season of ‘Game of Thrones’ except ‘more people will die’: The “Late Show” host joked on Friday night that the Republican healthcare legislation that is in the works is so classified it is the only thing that hasn’t leaked in Washington D.C., a nod to multiple leaks that have come out of the Trump administration. “What’s in it? Colbert facetiously asked during his Friday night monologue on CBS. “Who knows? All we know so far is their foolproof plan for getting it passed, ‘keeping their healthcare bill secret.'” The plan is so secretive and anticipated, he continued, that it is like the new season of “Game of Thrones,” but “somehow, more people will die.”
RUNDOWN
The Hill Obamacare: Six key parts of the Senate bill
Vox The healthcare industry doesn’t love Obamacare enough to save it
Politico Democrats use Trump “mean” comment to tar GOP
Roll Call Staff departures undermine GOP legislative agenda
STAT News Despite pressure over prices, pharma industry coasting on Capitol Hill
Associated Press Mom’s grief spurs New York bill targeting opioid dealers in death
NJ.com Democrats plan to take on MacArthur, who helped revive AHCA
Axios
Scientists find mutations that may let bird flu spread among humans
CNN
There’s no Senate healthcare bill yet. These are the key players
Calendar
MONDAY | JUNE 19
June 19-22. San Diego Convention Center. 111 W Harbor Dr. Biotechnology Innovation Organization annual convention. Details.
TUESDAY | JUNE 20
10:30 a.m. Dirksen 192. Senate Appropriations hearing on FDA’s budget. Details.
Noon. Rayburn 2103. Briefing on neuroscience research with the Congressional Neuroscience Caucus.
4:30 p.m. Carnegie Library. 801 K St. NW. Bipartisan Policy Center panel discussion on documentary “Unseen Enemy” with Johnson & Johnson and the Blue Ribbon Study Panel. Details.
WEDNESDAY | JUNE 21
11:30 a.m. National Press Club. Roundtable on “Healthcare in the Trump Era: Politics, policy and people.” Details.
THURSDAY | JUNE 22
10 a.m. Dirksen 138. Senate Appropriations committee hearing on NIH’s budget. Details.
FRIDAY | JUNE 23
9 a.m. 2123 Rayburn. House Energy and Commerce Committee hearing on CHIP reauthorization. Details.
