President Donald Trump called Wednesday for repealingthe Obamacare individual mandate in a tax overhaul, a daybefore House GOP leaders planned to unveil a bill without thatprovision.

In a pair of tweets, Trump said: “Wouldn’t it be great to Repealthe very unfair and unpopular Individual Mandate in ObamaCare anduse those savings for further Tax Cuts for the Middle Class. TheHouse and Senate should consider ASAP as the process of finalapproval moves along.”

The idea, proposed Sunday by Senator TomCotton of Arkansas, could complicate the plans of Republicans tokeep the health care and tax debates separate. Party leaders worrythat reopening the politically painful Obamacare debate would costthem crucial votes on a tax bill.

“What I don’t want to do is to add things that could again killtax reform like health care died over there,” House Ways and MeansChairman Kevin Brady said Tuesday on Hugh Hewitt’s radio show, whenasked about the idea. “So I say focus on jobs and growth andleapfrogging America to the lead pack worldwide.”

A "skinny" repeal of Obamacare that scrapped the individualmandate failed in July to pass the Senate after three GOP senatorsdefected. Scrapping the mandate’s tax penalty on most Americans whodon’t purchase insurance would raise $416 billion over a decade,and increase the number of uninsured by 15 million, according to aDecember 2016 estimate by theCongressional Budget Office.

50 votes

White House Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders seemed tocontradict the president’s stance on including individual mandaterepeal in tax legislation during a press briefing Wednesday.“We’re focused on pushing through tax cuts and tax reforms,separately,” Sanders said.

“Obviously we’ve never made it a secret that we’d like to repealand replace Obamacare,” she said, adding “We still think it’sprobably more likely to do something like that in the spring.”

Senate Republican Conference Chairman John Thune said Tuesday hedoesn’t know if the upper chamber’s tax legislation would ax theObamacare mandate. "I don’t anticipate that it will, but at thispoint I wouldn’t want to rule it out," he said.

Still, the South Dakota Republican said the idea has appeal.“I’m actually somewhat interested in that, because it hassignificant revenue implications,” he said. “The question is: Arethere 50 votes for something like that in the Senate?”

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