Nancy Pelosi mocks Trump’s health care push: ‘He’s making fools of his own people’
The White House appears to fully back House Speaker Paul Ryan’s controversial health care plan, despite less than stellar reviews from conservatives, Democrats, medical associations and doctors’ groups. Earlier this week Donald Trump threatened an electoral “blood bath” if House Republicans failed to push through the bill.
In a less-carnage oriented approach, the President has also reached out to House Republicans who oppose the plan with an invitation to a pizza and bowling party.
House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) is not impressed by the President’s new strategy.
“If he’s in a deal-making [mood] does that mean bowling at the White House in return for support for legislation? I mean, I find the charm offensive offensive. I really do,” Pelosi said during a breakfast in Washington, reports the Hill.
“I think he’s making fools of his own people, quite frankly. You don’t agree philosophically in what the legislation is? Let’s go bowling at the White House, OK?” she said. “Come on.”
Members of the House Freedom Caucus, a group associated with the Tea Party, have voiced their concerns that the law does not do enough to scale back federal involvement in Americans’ health care.
“Do we need to lower the bar in what we believe as conservatives simply because a Republican is in the White House?” South Carolina Republican Mark Sanford asked, according to NPR. Chief among their concerns is that the legislation fails to scrap Medicaid expansion fast enough.
In a seeming bid to get conservatives on board, the White House signaled Friday that they would consider speeding up the reversal of Medicaid expansion. That move, of course, does not sit well with the Democratic and Republican Governors around the country who are counting on the federal cash and might have some angry constituents on their hands if their health insurance is taken away.
Nationwide, more than 11 million people would lose their health care coverage if Medicaid expansion is rolled back, according to the Kaiser family foundation.