If a bill that would repeal portions of Obamacare fails in a planned Senate vote early next week, the effort would not be the end of the road for lawmakers, who would be left with the responsibility of rebooting Obamacare’s exchanges so they aren’t deeply damaged during an election year.
After Republicans couldn’t reach a consensus on a bill that would have repealed parts of Obamacare and replaced it with other provisions, they proposed dusting off a bill they had passed in 2015 and voting on it again now that they had a president who would sign it into law rather than veto it. Early Tuesday, however, enough Republicans opposed beginning debate on the bill to stop the bill from advancing, but Senate leaders said they still planned to move forward on a vote on whether to debate the legislation.
