Paul Ryan Calls Alternative Health Care Proposal `Intriguing'

(Bloomberg) -- House Speaker Paul Ryan said a health-care plan floated by Senators Lindsey Graham of South Carolina and Bill Cassidy of Louisiana “has got merit and has legs under it.” The comments, in an interview with the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, are Ryan’s most encouraging words yet for a proposal that grew out of the Senate’s failure to overhaul Obamacare.

The Graham-Cassidy proposal would send federal health-care funds to the states in block grants, while repealing Obamacare’s mandates that all Americans have insurance and most employers provide it. Some governors have gotten behind the alternative, and Ryan said “various caucuses in the House” are open to it.

If Republicans want to replace Obamacare without support from Democrats, they have to do it before a tactical maneuver, which allows them to pass legislation with 51 votes in the Senate, expires on Sept. 30.

To contact the reporter on this story: Anna Edgerton in Washington at aedgerton@bloomberg.net.

To contact the editors responsible for this story: Kevin Whitelaw at kwhitelaw@bloomberg.net, Justin Blum