Except they didn't "vote to repeal it" at all last night. And today we're hearing about Republicans in the House planning on voting to fund the $9 billion in subsidies for the cost sharing payments which Obama has been illegally funding by executive fiat the last several years.
In case you're not familiar with the details -- the cost sharing subsidies are payments which reduce co-pays and deductibles for low-income subscribers. These are a step beyond the subsidies, this doesn't reduce the premiums, but rather siginificantly reduces out-of-pocket expenses. The law is written in a way which requires insurers to grant these cost reductions to low income subscribers, regardless of whether the funds to reimburse the insurers are actually appropriated by Congress and paid out to the insurance companies. In other words, every year if the money isn't voted in to fund it, the ACA would immediately collapse because companies would be allowed to flea the marketplaces mid-year, and they certainly would, because they would be facing additional billions of losses due to the now unfunded discounts to low-income subscribers.
To work around this fatal flaw in ACA (one of many) Obama has been using executive orders to "appropriate" the money to pay the subsidies. This is of course an obvious violation of separation of powers (power of the purse is for Congress alone). And the House took the incredible step of suing the Executive branch, and they won. The ruling in the Federal Circuit court would immediately end the $9 billion of cost-sharing payments which Obama has been ordering the DHHS to make to insurance companues... was stayed upon appeal to the Supreme Court. If Trump decides to drop the appeal on January 21st, the payments cease, and ACA self destructs.
So, no, the Senate didn't vote to repeal anything, nor would they have to if anyone wanted to watch the ACA crash and burn. Of course very few elected representatives actually want to see a lot of very needy people lose their health insurance mid-year, as much as they didn't cause this dumpster fire, they will need to try to put it out. So we're likely to see more votes to prop up the failing ACA over the coming months until the replacement can be made ready.
