Politics
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Paul Ryan.
House Speaker Paul Ryan gave a dire warning to Republicans as the fate of the Senate's healthcare bill remained up in the air."I mean, the Senate is a razor thin majority," Ryan said in a "Fox & Friends" interview that aired Wednesday. "That is a very tight majority. But we have this opportunity and we just cannot blow it."
"And that's why we are so motivated," he continued. "That's why we're moving so quickly. So many people don't realize all that we're doing because we're doing it so quickly. Because we just want to make good on our promises."
On Tuesday, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell delayed a vote on the healthcare bill until after the July 4 recess as a number of Republican senators either said they would vote against the recently released Better Care Reconciliation Act, or remained non-committal.
Then on Wednesday, aides on Capitol Hill told The Washington Post that McConnell was trying to send a revised version of the bill to the Congressional Budget Office by Friday.
Republicans can only lose two votes and still be able to pass the legislation, which the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office found would cause 22 million Americans to lose their insurance. The House bill, the American Health Care Act, was predicted to cost 23 million Americans their insurance, according to the CBO.
The bill would also eliminates taxes introduced by the Affordable Care Act, better known as "Obamacare," and cuts into the deficit.
Some Republicans want the legislation to become more conservative, while some more moderate senators are concerned that the current bill will harm their constituents, particularly by cutting future growth in Medicaid spending.