Trump tells lawmakers he expects deal 'very quickly' on healthcare

[March 29, 2017] WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. President Donald Trump told a group of senators on Tuesday that he expected lawmakers would be able to reach a deal on healthcare, without offering specifics on how they would do it or what had changed since a healthcare reform bill was pulled last week for insufficient support.

"I have no doubt that that's going to happen very quickly," Trump said at a bipartisan reception held for senators and their spouses at the White House.

"I think it's going to happen because we've all been promising - Democrat, Republican - we've all been promising that to the American people," he said.

A Republican plan backed by Trump to overhaul the U.S. healthcare system was pulled on Friday after it failed to garner enough support to pass the Republican-controlled House of Representatives.

Trump, a Republican, did not mention that failure at the reception nor did he offer specifics on how he planned for lawmakers to reach a consensus on a healthcare bill that would repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act, familiarly known as Obamacare.

Trump told lawmakers at the reception that he would be talking about infrastructure and investing in the military, without offering a time frame or details.

"Hopefully, it will start being bipartisan, because everybody really wants the same thing. We want greatness for this country that we love," he said.

(Reporting by Ayesha Rascoe; Editing by Leslie Adler, Toni Reinhold)

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