Autumn Price
Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) will be meeting with President Trump on Tuesday to discuss the Senate GOP health care bill, The Hill reports.
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The former 2016 presidential candidate and leading opponent of the current bill tweeted about the meeting Tuesday morning, adding that the bill needs “major improvement.”
I'll discuss w/ him how to fix bill & get more to a YES on real repeal, things I've tried to tell Senate leaders with no result so far
— Rand Paul (@RandPaul) June 27, 2017
“Headed to meet with @realDonaldTrump this afternoon. The bill is currently not real repeal and needs major improvement,” Paul said.
“I’ll discuss w/ him how to fix bill & get more to a YES on real repeal, things I’ve tried to tell Senate leaders with no result so far,” he continued.
RELATED: Rand Paul wants to make his fellow senators actually read the health care bill before they vote
Paul has been a strong opponent of the current healthcare bill, calling it “Obamacare Lite” and criticizing its new entitlements.
“On the current bill, I’m not voting to get on it unless it changes before we get to it,” he said
In last week’s joint press release with Senators Ted Cruz (R-Texas), Ron Johnson (R-Wisc.) and Mike Lee (R-Utah), Paul announced why he could not support the current bill.
“Currently, for a variety of reasons, we are not ready to vote for this bill, but we are open to negotiation and obtaining more information before it is brought to the floor,” the release reads.
“There are provisions in this draft that represent an improvement to our current healthcare system, but it does not appear this draft as written will accomplish the most important promise that we made to Americans: to repeal Obamacare and lower their health care costs.”
“I don’t think there is anybody in America that is more against Obamacare than myself. I’ve seen the ravages of it,” Paul later said. “I’ve traveled to 42 different states running on the repeal of Obamacare.”
“I just didn’t run on Obamacare-Lite,” Paul continued. “I didn’t run on replacing it with more government programs. I didn’t run on allowing the death spiral of Obamacare to continue just to allow it to be subsidized with taxpayer money.”
“There is no money to keep subsidizing insurance. There is no money to expand Medicaid unless you want to raise taxes. We’re actually cutting taxes.” “You have to be honest with people. […] I think we can do better than this. My hope is not to defeat the bill but to make the bill better.”
“Now the discussion begins,” Paul said, adding that without the 50 votes needed to pass the bill, maybe the discussion could now begin “in earnest.”
“We need to negotiate over what’s good, what’s bad and what we can get in the bill to make it better,” Paul concluded.
In April, Paul was optimistic that President Trump would be willing to listen to some of his ideas on healthcare.
“I had a great time today with @realDonaldTrump,” Paul tweeted, “and believe we are getting closer to an agreement on health care!”
RELATED: What exactly is the point of this Republican health bill?
“We had a great day with the president,” Paul later said. “Played some golf, and we talked and we talked about a little bit of healthcare. I continue to be very optimistic that we are getting closer and closer to an agreement on repealing ObamaCare.”
The president had previously tweeted that “talks on Repealing and Replacing ObamaCare are, and have been, going on.”
Trump also tweeted about Paul’s reluctance to support the previous GOP healthcare bill back in March, saying, “I feel sure that my friend @RandPaul will come along with the new and great health care program because he knows Obamacare is a disaster!”
