Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images(NEW YORK) — Last week, Rep. Ted Poe, R-Texas, became the first conservative Republican to jump ship from the House Freedom Caucus after the group effectively blocked the GOP health care plan last month. Now that the GOP is reportedly working to resurrect the bill he supported, Poe says he thinks House Republicans “will have another bite at the apple.”
House Republicans have discussed some changes to the bill that they hope will bring more “yes” votes to the table. But Poe told ABC News’ Jonathan Karl and Rick Klein on the “Powerhouse Politics” podcast that “it’s basically the same bill.”
Protection for patients with pre-existing conditions and for young people on their parents’ insurance will likely be maintained in the bill’s final version because “the Republicans made that promise,” Poe said.
However, Poe said it’s not the bill’s contents that will be the tipping point in garnering conservative votes.
“At the end of the day my friends — and they’re all my friends in the Freedom Caucus — need to understand that they’re not going to get their purest bill no matter what it is. Because that bill will never pass.”
When the Republican health care proposal, the American Health Care Act, was pulled late last month, House Speaker Paul Ryan said “moving from an opposition party to a governing party comes with growing pains.”
Even though Republicans have had control of Congress for years, Poe said they’ve taken on the role of the opposition because they knew most of their legislative priorities wouldn’t make it through former President Barack Obama.
He added that his former colleagues in the Freedom Caucus have become the opposition party within the Republican Party, “and that’s really unfortunate.”
“Some people have gotten in the opposition mode so well that they have not learned we have to govern now. It’s time to govern. And saying no is not leading,” Poe said.
President Donald Trump has said he would go after members of the Freedom Caucus in their races in 2018 if they continue to oppose the health care proposal, and late last week he tweeted a call to his supporters to oppose caucus members. But Poe said it’s “more rhetoric than it is anything else.”
“He’s trying to get the attention of those people who don’t support him,” Poe said. “But I don’t know that he would actually campaign against people who vote against his policies in the Republican Party. … I think we’re all Republicans and I don’t see that that’s really going to happen.”
Copyright © 2017, ABC Radio. All rights reserved.