WASHINGTON (AP) – Congressional Republicans on Monday pointed fingers and assigned blame after their epic failure on health care and a weekend digesting the outcome.
The divisions, coming on top of House Republicans’ inability to deliver on a priority they all share – repealing and replacing “Obamacare” – raised serious questions about whether they will be able to achieve their other legislative goals for the year or even pass must-do spending legislation in time to avert a government shutdown at midnight April 28.
The hard-right House Freedom Caucus, which withheld a bloc of votes from the White House-backed health care legislation, came in for most of the criticism from fellow lawmakers.
“Clearly moving forward, we’re going to have to look at where a governing majority comes from. That’s going to require some answers from the Freedom Caucus,” said GOP Rep. Ryan Costello of Pennsylvania.
Like a number of other more moderate-leaning Republicans, Costello said he would have voted “no” on the bill in the end, partly because it kept moving to the right as House leaders and the White House made concessions to the Freedom Caucus without ever succeeding in locking in their support. President Donald Trump and House Speaker Paul Ryan decided to pull the bill from the House floor on Friday after it became clear it was bound to fail.