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Crist: Rubio Won't Return My Phone Call About Health Care

May 9, 2017

Rep. Charlie Crist (D., Fla.) complained Tuesday that former opponent Sen. Marco Rubio (R., Fla.) hasn't returned his phone call about health care legislation.

The Senate is in the process of writing its own health care bill after the Republican-led House narrowly passed the American Health Care Act last week, which repeals major facets of Obamacare, also known as the Affordable Care Act.

Crist, like every other Democrat in the House, voted against the bill and blasted it during his interview on MSNBC. Host Chris Jansing asked Crist if he had spoken to Rubio, who he ran against in 2010 for the Senate, about what could be done to make the bill more "palatable" to Democrats.

"Well, what can be done is the right thing, just to be plain and simple about it," Crist said. "The right thing is to provide health care for the American people."

Crist said he had conducted conversations with senators to "right the wrong" House Republicans did with the AHCA, and it was was on the other chamber to get it right.

"What's Senator Rubio telling you, congressman?" Jansing asked.

"Nothing yet," Crist said. "I'm looking forward to getting my call returned. In the meantime, I'll be patient, because it's a virtue."

Both Rubio and Crist ran for the Republican nomination for the U.S. Senate in Florida in 2010, but Crist, the state's former governor, eventually dropped out and ran as an independent. Rubio then crushed him in the general election, winning 48.9 percent of the vote to Crist's 29.7 percent.

Crist eventually joined the Democratic Party in 2012, ran unsuccessfully for governor of Florida in 2014, and then was elected to the House of Representatives in 2016.