Associated Press

Associated Press

WASHINGTON

Their top legislative priority dangling in peril, President Donald Trump and Republican leaders cajoled recalcitrant GOP lawmakers Wednesday to back their health care overhaul.

A day ahead of a long-awaited House showdown roll call, conservatives insisted they had the votes to torpedo the measure and the number of lawmakers publicly expressing opposition snowballed.

Trump huddled at the White House with 18 lawmakers, a mix of supporters and opponents, Vice President Mike Pence saw around two dozen and House GOP leaders held countless talks with lawmakers at the Capitol.

The sessions came as leaders rummaged for votes on a roll call they can ill afford to lose without wounding their clout for the rest of the GOP agenda.

Asked by reporters if he’d keep pushing a health overhaul if the House rejects the measure, Trump said, “We’ll see what happens.”

In a count by The Associated Press, at least 25 Republicans said they opposed the bill and others were leaning that way, enough to narrowly defeat the measure.

The number was in constant flux amid eleventh-hour lobbying by the White House and GOP leaders.

Including vacancies and expected absentees, the bill would be defeated if 23 Republicans join all Democrats in voting “no.”

Most opponents were conservatives asserting that the GOP legislation demolishing former President Barack Obama’s health care law did not go far enough.

They insisted it must repeal the law’s requirements that insurers pay for specified services like maternity care and cover all comers, including the sickest, which they say drive up premiums.

Moderates were daunted by projections of 24 million Americans losing coverage in a decade and higher out-of-pocket costs for many low-income and older people, as predicted by the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office.

For now, the White House and House leaders showed no sign of delaying their legislation, their initial attempt to deliver on a pledge to erase Obama’s law they’ve repeated since its 2010 enactment.

“There is no plan B. There is plan A and plan A, we’re going to get this done,” White House spokesman Sean Spicer said.

Democrats were uniformly against the GOP repeal drive.

They laud Obama’s statute for expanding health care coverage to 20 million more people and imposing coverage requirements on insurers.

Republicans face an even tougher fight in the Senate.