Encouraging news from Washington as U.S. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell seems to have received the message from Virginia’s Tuesday elections, adding in provisions to repeal Obamacare as well as add in pro-life provisions to strip Planned Parenthood of their federal funding. From The Hill:
Conservatives led by GOP Sens. Ted Cruz (Texas), Rand Paul (Ky.) and Tom Cotton (Ark.) pushed hard to include the provision, which would eliminate the federal penalty on people who do not buy health insurance. President Trump has also pushed for the provision to be part of the tax bill.
McConnell told reporters that adding the individual mandate repeal will make it easier to muster 50 votes to pass the bill.
“We’re optimistic that inserting the individual mandate repeal would be helpful and that’s obviously the view of the Senate Finance Committee Republicans as well,” McConnell said.
CNBC reported earlier that tax reform was not only imperiled but has started to wane as House Republicans continued to complicate the tax reform package beyond what the Trump White House was willing to accept.
Meanwhile, Trump tax advisor Gary Cohn is emphasizing that whatever bills are passed by both the House and Senate that the conference bill will not only be something acceptable to the Trump White House, but will be passed by Christmas.
Meanwhile, Planned Parenthood is taking exception with a provision of the tax reform bill that allows children to become the beneficiary of pre-tax 529 college tuition credits in utero. The intransigence of Planned Parenthood over this issue is once again raising the specter that federal funding for Planned Parenthood might very well come back on the table as conservatives are beginning to see their 2018 chances hinge on bold strokes rather than pastels.
