Trump lashes out at GOP Sen. Lisa Murkowski on Twitter after health-care vote

(Image credit: Joe Raedle/Getty Images)

published 26 July 2017

On Wednesday morning, President Trump targeted Alaska Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R) for her dissenting vote on Tuesday's motion to proceed to health-care debate. Murkowski "really let the Republicans, and our country, down yesterday," Trump tweeted.

In a statement Tuesday evening, Murkowski said she voted against the motion to proceed "to give the Senate another chance" to tackle health-care reform. "I have repeatedly said that health-care reform ... should go through the committee process where stakeholders can weigh in and ideas can be vetted in a bipartisan forum," she said. Murkowski and Maine Sen. Susan Collins (R) were the only Republican senators to vote against the motion to proceed.

Late Tuesday night, a vote on the Better Care Reconciliation Act — Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell's (R-Ky.) plan to repeal and replace ObamaCare — failed. Senators will vote Wednesday on a straight repeal of ObamaCare, which is also expected to fail, setting the stage for a so-called "skinny repeal" plan that would eliminate ObamaCare's individual and employer mandates as well as the medical device tax and leave the rest of the law in place.