Republican Rebellion: 5 GOP Senators Oppose Health Bill

Update:  As it turns out, the Senate’s healthcare bill may be even ‘dead-er’ on arrival than originally thought as Senators Rand Paul (KY), Ted Cruz (TX), Ron Johnson (WI) and Mike Lee (UT) have issued a joint statement saying they will oppose the bill, as it is currently written, because it does not fulfill a promise made to the American public to “repeal Obamacare and lower their health care costs.”

“Currently, for a variety of reasons, we are not ready to vote for this bill, but we are open to negotiation and obtaining more information before it is brought to the floor.  There are provisions in this draft that represent an improvement to our current health care system, but it does not appear this draft as a written will accomplish the most important promise that we made to Americans: to repeal Obamacare and lower their health care costs.“

Statement from. Rand Paul, Ted Cruz, Mike Lee, Ron Johnson (!) opposing health care bill as it currently stands pic.twitter.com/oxwwvdTapo

— James Arkin (@JamesArkin) June 22, 2017

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The Senate healthcare bill has been “in the open” for less than an hour, and already NBC’s Chuck Todd reports that it may be DOA after “at least” 3 GOP senators plan to publicly announce their opposition to the bill.

In a tweet, NBC anchor Chuck Todd said that according to a “solid” unnamed source “at least 3 GOP sens (perhaps more) plan to announce public opposition to McConnell health bill later today.”

Per solid source: at least 3 GOP sens (perhaps more) plan to announce public opposition to McConnell health bill later today. Developing

— Chuck Todd (@chucktodd) June 22, 2017

As a reminder, Republicans can lose no more than two Republicans, assuming all Democrats in the Senate oppose measure, as expected.

For now, hospital stocks far more excited by the announced provisions noted earlier, don’t buy it, or at least assume that it will be relatively easy to “flip” one or more of the three holdouts.