House Minority Leader Rep. Kevin McCarthy admitted to donors that trying to take healthcare away from people was a really bad idea.

Read the biggest developments from Michael Cohen's testimony.

The Washington Post reported:

Speaking privately to his donors, House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy squarely blamed Republican losses in last year’s midterm elections on the GOP push to roll back health insurance protections for people with preexisting conditions — and in turn blamed his party’s right flank.

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“When we couldn’t pass the repeal of Obamacare the first way through, an amendment came because the Freedom Caucus wouldn’t vote for” the original House bill, McCarthy said. “That amendment put [the] preexisting condition campaign against us, and so even people who are running for the very first time got attacked on that. And that was the defining issue and the most important issue in the race.”

Republicans Realize Taking Away Healthcare Is A Bad Idea, But They’re Still Going To Do It Anyway

McCarthy can blame the Freedom Caucus, but the reality is that he and then-Speaker Paul Ryan backed the far right plan and a bill that had an uncertain future in the Senate. The Freedom Caucus wasn’t the House leadership, so the failure of 2018 belongs to the Republican House leadership and Donald Trump.

McCarthy’s comments never backed off of continuing to take healthcare away from people. The House Minority Leader said that it was a bad idea, but he didn’t say that House Republicans would stop trying to make sure that people had less healthcare that costs more money.

The effort to take healthcare away from people with a midterm election coming was a terrible idea. What’s even worse is that Republicans have learned nothing, and are still trying to take healthcare away from the most vulnerable Americans.
The only way to keep your healthcare is to keep Republicans far from power.

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Jason Easley

Jason is the managing editor. He is also a White House Press Pool and a Congressional correspondent for PoliticusUSA. Jason has a Bachelor’s Degree in Political Science. His graduate work focused on public policy, with a specialization in social reform movements.

Awards and  Professional Memberships

Member of the Society of Professional Journalists and The American Political Science Association