GOP shooting for Obamacare replacement plan by July

“We will want to have our product done by then,” Rep. Fred Upton, R-Mich., chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, said Wednesday at a Conservative Reform Network event in Washington.

But Upton said the current plan isn’t to hold a vote on the plan this year. Instead, Republicans want to tee it up for the next Congress and next president to consider.

“It is really to begin the foundation to prepare for a Republican president,” he said.

Upton is part of a joint task force of four committee chairmen currently trying to put together an Obamacare replacement plan that the House can coalesce around. The other members of the task force head the House budget, education and the workforce, and ways and means committees.

The group met last week, and will meet again shortly, he said.

The House and Senate earlier this year approved a bill that repealed key parts of Obamacare.

The House has voted more than 70 times to either fully repeal Obamacare or change parts of the law, and some of those votes resulted in bills that President Obama signed into law. But the January vote was the first time the Senate has been able to pass a repeal bill. The Senate vote finally became possible after Republicans used a legislative maneuver called reconciliation that lets budget and spending bills be approved by a simple majority vote.

House Speaker Paul Ryan appointed the task force after the GOP’s Baltimore annual retreat, amid criticism from Democrats that the GOP hasn’t reached consensus on a replacement plan. Upton said the task force has a “lot of good ideas” but the committee hasn’t finalized any proposals yet.

He did say there were certain ideas that he liked, such as expanding health savings accounts and letting people shop for insurance across state lines.

“We are looking for a more patient-centered approach where people, individuals will be able to make the choices for themselves,” he said.