I agree, and think Josh is wrong; even though he says “in this form”, from the way his statement is worded it’s clear he wouldn’t support anything with the Medicaid rollback. There was no real need for him to go this far in his opposition statement, especially making it with Sandoval next to him; he could have easily made a more weaselly statement. He’s put himself into a corner, intentionally.
I’ve seen a number of reporters say that they’ve heard McConnell is going to bring the bill up for a vote next week regardless of anything, whether he knows he has the votes or not. My bet: I’m sure he wants it to pass and will do a lot of strong-arming for it, but at the same time I wouldn’t be surprised at all if he simply keeps it exactly in its current form, puts it up for a vote, and allows both the “moderates” and conservatives (Cruz, Lee, Paul) to vote against it. This whole business makes it look like he just wants it to be over with, and internally he could blame Ryan for the bill’s problems.