Democrats seize on John McCain’s message in health care fight

USA TODAY

Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., walks to the Senate floor to vote in favor of a motion to proceed on the effort to repeal and replace Obamacare on July 25, 2017, less than a week after he was diagnosed with brain cancer.

WASHINGTON — Democrats are seizing on GOP Sen. John McCain’s call for a back-to-the-drawing-board approach to health care reform, with committee hearings and input from both parties if the GOP bill fails.

The Arizona Republican’s message — delivered Tuesday during his dramatic return to the Senate after revealing he has brain cancer — bolstered Democrats’ long-running complaints about being cut out of the process.

During a Senate floor speech Wednesday, Senate Minority Whip Dick Durbin, D-Ill., read portions of McCain’s speech and urged colleagues to read it, too.

On Tuesday, Durbin said McCain “really begged us, pleaded, and urged us to get back to that time when we worked together on a bipartisan basis to solve problems ... John McCain was right.”

Minority Leader Chuck Schumer of New York said Wednesday the Senate could move on to other important business in a bipartisan way “If we stop playing this game with TrumpCare and sent it back to committee and did regular order — as John McCain preached so well yesterday.”

McCain returned to the Senate to cast a critical vote in favor of advancing legislation to repeal and replace Obamacare. But he predicted GOP efforts would likely fail and said the Senate should hold hearings, markups and consultation with Democrats, which have all been lacking.

McCain, battling cancer, returns to Senate and casts critical health care vote

Senate health care bill: Where we are now

Sen. Joe Donnelly, D-Ind., offered a Democratic motion to send the GOP bill to the Finance Committee with instructions to strike provisions that would reduce Medicaid benefits. Donnelly’s motion is the first of several Democrats are preparing to offer that would ask committees to strike aspects of the bill they oppose. Sen. Jeff Merkley, D-Ore., announced on Wednesday that he filed more than 100 amendments, all of them motions to refer the bill to a committee.

“That’s what John McCain’s been calling for,” said Senate Finance Committee member Tom Carper, D-Del., in an interview. “Regular order.”

McCain, however, opposed Donnelly's motion, which failed 52-48.

Don Stewart, a spokesman for Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, said such motions are “dilatory tactics” and fodder for Democrats’ campaign ads. The motions send the bill back to committee for three days, but no committee action is required.

“These are ads,” he said. “And Donnelly happens to be up for re-election.”

Democratic aides say the motions aren’t dilatory but are one of the only ways the minority can force Republicans to send the bill back to committees to consider specific topics. They also invoked a rule on Wednesday to force the postponement of several Senate committee hearings as they continued to blast the GOP legislation from the Senate floor.

Democrats have been calling on McConnell to work with them to fix the Affordable Care Act through a bipartisan committee process, but Republicans say Democrats aren’t offering positive solutions. Senate Republicans, who have only a 52-seat majority, are attempting to pass health care legislation under an expedited procedural route requiring only 51 votes for passage.

Carper said the message coming from McCain, a Republican who is “widely respected by just about everybody except (President) Donald Trump,” was “hugely” important.

“In all the years I’ve been here ... I’ve never seen anything like this,” Carper said. “To be flying by the seat of our pants like this with so much at stake is insanity.”