Bill on health care, drug prices passes House

WASHINGTON — Democrats pushed legislation buttressing the 2010 health care law and curbing prescription drug prices through the House on Thursday, advancing a bill that has no chance of surviving in the Senate or getting President Donald Trump’s signature and seemed engineered with next year’s elections in mind.

The measure forced Republicans into the uncomfortable political position of casting a single vote on legislation that contained popular drug pricing restraints they support, plus language strengthening President Barack Obama’s health care statute that they oppose.

In the end, all but five voting Republicans opposed the overall package as the measure passed by a mostly party-line 234-183.

Much of the bill focused on reversing steps — largely backed by GOP lawmakers — that Trump has taken to weaken Obama’s law, a statute he has vowed to repeal ever since his presidential campaign. The measure would restore money Trump has cut to publicize the law and help patients enroll for its benefits, block Trump’s expansion of the availability of low-cost, low-coverage plans and help states set up their own online marketplaces where policies are sold.

Democrats view Obama’s law as one of their greatest recent achievements, and see efforts to strengthen it as perhaps their most effective issue going into next year’s presidential and congressional elections. They said Trump’s moves were part of his effort to erode the law, which has expanded coverage by about 20 million people.

“Here is the Democratic response,” said Rep. Hakeem Jeffries of New York, a member of the House Democratic leadership. “Keep your hands off of the health care of everyday Americans.”

Democrats said that by giving states more leeway to make low-price plans with skimpy coverage available, Trump was enabling the sale of policies that don’t cover people with pre-existing conditions. Democrats say a major factor in their takeover of the House in last November’s elections was their hammering of Republicans for making such patients vulnerable to losing coverage.