How the push for a Senate health-care vote fell apart amid GOP tensions
By Robert Costa, Sean Sullivan, Juliet Eilperin and Kelsey Snell June 28 at 8:46 PM
Sen. Dean Heller was sitting two seats away from President Trump and facing his grim-faced colleagues this week when he decided to crack a pointed joke.
Heller — a square-jawed, sandy-haired moderate Republican — said the attack ads against him, paid for by a Trump-allied super PAC, should have used his own image instead of actor Matt Damon’s. There were scattered laughs, including a chuckle from Trump. But many of the Republican lawmakers lining tables in the East Room stayed mute.
The senator from Nevada then reiterated that he had deep reservations about the party’s major rewrite of the nation’s health-care laws, despite the Trump network’s efforts to pressure him to back the legislation. Trump nodded and said he understood Heller’s view. A couple of hours later, the super PAC pulled the ads off the air.
Nearly everyone there Tuesday had a different take on the meeting, reflecting the Republican divide amid the struggle to fulfill a signature party promise.
White House officials and Trump loyalists saw a president diving in to patch up strife and save legislation that had been curbed in the Senate. Some seasoned senators, however, saw a president unable to grasp policy details or the obstacles ahead, and talked with each other after the gathering about what they saw as a bizarre scene. That Republican disconnect has been a constant ever since the Senate health bill was unveiled.
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https://www.washingtonpost.com/powerpost/how-the-push-for-a-senate-health-care-vote-fell-apart-amid-gop-tensions/2017/06/28/8cdf528e-5c18-11e7-9fc6-c7ef4bc58d13_story.html
