Republican members of the United States House of Representatives have worked long and hard to pass a bill that repeals the Affordable Care Act, commonly known as Obamacare. Today, May 4, they finally succeeded — and they celebrated with cases of Bud Light in the Capitol building.
“They are rolling cases of beer into Capitol and coming to the White House afterwards for a celebration,” Josh Dawsey, the White House reporter for Politico, tweeted. “Kind of remarkable. So far to go.”
Alexandra Jaffe, a reporter for Vice News, also spotted the Bud Light. She also added another detail: People were attempting to hide the beer.
“Cases upon cases of beer just rolled into the Capitol on a cart covered in a sheet,” Jaffe tweeted. “Spotted Bud Light peeking out from the sheet.”
Didn't catch a good pic but here's what our camera shot pic.twitter.com/06rrHmqjJc
— Alexandra Jaffe (@ajjaffe) May 4, 2017
The bill passed with 217 votes in favor and 213 votes against. Just six weeks prior, an earlier version of the bill failed to pass. The Congressional Budget Office’s review of the first version of the bill noted that it would cause 24 million Americans to live without health insurance within 10 years of passing. The current bill was rushed to a vote before the CBO had a chance to review it.
As Dawsey referenced in his tweet, the new healthcare bill still has a long way to go before becoming law. It first must go to the Senate, where it’s not expected to pass, or pass with heavy revisions. Those revisions would then have to be sent to the House for another vote, and then to President Donald Trump.
It’s unclear what the outcome of the long road ahead will be, but for now, Republicans are partying. Trump promised them a “big press conference” at the Rose Garden of the White House. And they have chosen Bud Light as their preferred celebratory beverage (except for Trump, who is a teetotaler).