Trump pressures GOP in tweets to repeal 'very unfair' individual mandate as part of tax reform

(Image credit: NICHOLAS KAMM/AFP/Getty Images)

published 1 November 2017

President Trump tweeted Wednesday his support for including the repeal of the Affordable Care Act's individual mandate in the upcoming tax reform bill written by congressional Republicans.

Minutes before Trump's tweet was published, Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) had voiced his support for the same idea on Fox News. Sen. Tom Cotton (R-Ark.) has also been a vocal proponent of including the individual mandate's repeal in a tax reform bill.

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In July, a Republican health-care bill that would have eliminated ObamaCare's individual mandate failed in the Senate after three GOP senators — John McCain (Ariz.), Lisa Murkowski (Alaska), and Susan Collins (Maine) — voted against the measure. The Republican tax bill's rollout has already been delayed in the House over disagreements over key details that have yet to be finalized. On Wednesday, another prominent Republican, Senate Finance Committee Chairman Orrin Hatch (Utah), told Politico's Seung Min Kim: "I would prefer to stay out of the health-care process because it's tough enough to do a tax bill."

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Kelly O'Meara Morales is a staff writer at The Week. He graduated from Sarah Lawrence College and studied Middle Eastern history and nonfiction writing amongst other esoteric subjects. When not compulsively checking Twitter, he writes and records music, subsists on tacos, and watches basketball.

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