GOP Struggles to Find Support for Healthcare Bill in Senate

Trump
President Donald Trump delivers remarks at Kirkwood Community College in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, on June 21. Jonathan Ernst/Reuters

The GOP is failing to find broad support for its Senate healthcare bill, revealed on Thursday, with five senators already having stated they will not back the legislation.

The intended overhaul of Obamacare in the Senate has prompted a number of Republicans to raise concerns about facets of the bill, including cuts to Medicaid, which they believe will directly impact the most vulnerable members of society.

These reservations have led to several senators stating they will not back the bill in its current form, with others doubting the bill will pass during the vote, given Trump can only have two 'no' votes from GOP senators.

"I have very serious concerns about the bill," Republican Senator Susan Collins told ABC's This Week in a Sunday interview. "It's hard for me to see the bill passing this week."

And Senator Ron Johnson, from Wisconsin, who is among the five members who has already stated they will not be supporting the bill, said in a Sunday interview with NBC's Meet the Press it was too early to hold a vote on the matter.

"We don't have enough information. I don't have the feedback from constituencies who will not have had enough time to view the Senate bill. We should not be voting on this next week," he said.

However, President Donald Trump's counselor Kellyanne Conway dismissed the idea the bill would not make it through the Senate, despite the House version of the bill initially struggling to garner support and being polled one of the least popular pieces of legislation ever.

"The president is prepared to have a conversation, a discussion, a negotiation with those senators and others," she said on ABC's This Week. "I would point out for the few who say that they're currently a no, you're talking about 45 or more who are currently yeses. So that tells you something."

However, host George Stephanopoulos pointed out the GOP did not have 45 yes votes for the bill, to which Conway responded: "We also heard the House bill was never going to pass. We heard this guy can never get elected."

She added: "We're very confident that the Senate bill will get through and that we're going to have health care reform that literally takes away these draconian Obamacare taxes, taxes on medical devices, prescription drugs."

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