User:Captcpt/Efforts to repeal the Affordable Care Act

This is taken from the section titled "115th Congress (2017–2018)" from Efforts to repeal the Affordable Care Act.

On January 12, 2017, the Senate voted 51 to 48 to pass an FY2017 budget resolution, S.Con.Res. 3, that contained language allowing the repeal of the Affordable Care Act through the budget reconciliation process, which disallows a filibuster in the Senate. In spite of efforts during the vote-a-rama (a proceeding in which each amendment was considered and voted upon for about 10 minutes each until all 160 were completed) that continued into the early hours of the morning, Democrats could not prevent "the GOP from following through on its repeal plans."

On January 20, 2017, Donald Trump was sworn in as President of the United States. Trump and many Republicans have vowed to repeal and replace Obamacare. President Trump signed an executive order on January 20, 2017, his first day in office, that according to then White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer would "ease the burden of Obamacare as we transition from repeal and replace". Spicer would not elaborate further when asked for more details.

On March 6, 2017, House Republicans announced their replacement for the ACA, the American Health Care Act. The bill was withdrawn on March 24, 2017 after it was certain that the House would fail to garner enough votes to pass it. The result was in-fighting within the Republican Party.

On May 4, 2017, the United States House of Representatives voted to pass the American Health Care Act (and thereby repeal most of the Affordable Care Act) by a narrow margin of 217 to 213, sending the bill to the Senate for deliberation. The Senate indicated they would write their own version of the bill, instead of voting on the House version. On June 22, the Better Care Reconciliation Act of 2017 was unveiled.

On July 25, 2017, the United States Senate voted to proceed to debate on the American Health Care Act. The Senate voted 50–50, largely along party lines with the Republicans for and the Democrats against proceeding, requiring Vice President Pence to cast the tie-breaking vote. Republican Senators Susan Collins of Maine and Lisa Murkowski of Alaska crossed the aisle to vote against the motion.

On July 27, 2017, the Health Care Freedom Act, also known as the skinny repeal, was introduced. This bill was defeated 49–51, with Republican senators Susan Collins, John McCain, and Lisa Murkowski voting against it along with all the Democrats and independents.

On September 13, 2017, an amendment to the American Health Care Act, commonly known as Graham-Cassidy, was submitted. The bill was sponsored by Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, with Bill Cassidy of Louisiana as a co-sponsor. A spokesman for the Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell said that a vote was planned to occur before September 30, which was the deadline to pass bills under budget reconciliation. Rand Paul and John McCain indicated that they would vote against the bill. Ultimately, McConnell announced on September 26 that the Senate would not vote on the Graham-Cassidy bill.

My Additions (would be at the end of this section):

On October 12, 2017, President Donald Trump enacted the end to government subsidies provided to health insurance companies intended to assist with affordability. The Congressional Budget Office estimated by 2018, this loss would result in approximately a 20 percent increase in individual insurance premiums to maintain and extend insurance coverage to lower-income groups as well as result in a lower prevalence of insured individuals. The move for this action had mixed outlook from both Democrats and Republicans with its more instantaneous implementation, however opponents to the Affordable Care Act had supported the gradual implementation of this move since the introduction under the Obama administration in order to minimize responsibility for the policy.

On November 2, 2017, a bill later known as the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act was introduced by Representative Kevin Brady of Texas. Included in the bill was the move to strike the basis of individual mandate taxation to zero percent, which exacted a tax penalty onto individuals who did not have “minimum essential health coverage” under the Affordable Care Act. While this was not a direct effort to repeal the ACA, economists deemed the loss of the individual mandate was associated with lower incentives and interest in obtaining health insurance coverage. The law was signed into effect on December 22, 2017 by Donald Trump, with the loss of individual mandate taxation being set to take effect January 1, 2019.