House Speaker Paul Ryan has one major opponent in his fight to overhaul Medicare, Medicaid and welfare programs: Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, Politico reports.
Ryan said in an interview with the Weekly Standard that his priorities for 2018 are to reform entitlements, welfare and healthcare.
"I don’t think the healthcare issue is done," he said of the GOP’s failed attempt to repeal Obamacare. "At the end of the day, we’ve got to go after the root cause — healthcare inflation and entitlements. Welfare reform is going to be our next lift."
"We’re never going to give up on entitlement reform and the things we need to do to get the debt under control," Ryan added. "With one more reconciliation, I think we have a pretty good shot at getting some of these things done."
However, less than two days after Ryan’s interview, McConnell said at a breakfast sponsored by Axios that "Democrats are not going to be interested in entitlement reform, so I would not expect to see that on the agenda" for next year, according to The Washington Post.
"What the Democrats are willing to do is important, because in the Senate, with rare exceptions like the tax bill, we have to have Democratic involvement," he added.
The majority leader told reporters last week: "the sensitivity of entitlements is such that you almost have to have a bipartisan agreement in order to achieve a result."
"All you have to do is the math. Unless it’s bipartisan, then you’re talking about reconciliation which means you have to pass a budget, you have to get reconciliation instructions and you have to get 51 Republicans all to vote for it," Senate Majority Whip John Cornyn, R-Texas, told Politico. "That’s a pretty steep hill to climb."