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The Republican attempt to reshape the nation’s health-care system has grown increasingly dependent this week on the fragile alliance between Senate GOP leaders and a man they have clashed bitterly with for years: Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Tex.). Senate leaders are struggling to build conservative support for their emerging bill, with GOP aides and senators voicing growing skepticism that hard-right Sens. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) and Mike Lee (R-Utah) can be persuaded to back it. Conservative organizations, meanwhile, are complaining that Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) is offering proposals that would not sufficiently dismantle the law known as Obamacare. (Sullivan and Snell, 6/13)

A Republican congressman who helped shepherd the party’s health-care overhaul bill through the House last month predicted Tuesday that a final bill will pass the Senate and land on the president’s desk before August. House Energy and Commerce Chairman Greg Walden’s estimate, described at The Wall Street Journal’s CFO Network meeting in Washington, suggests he is optimistic that Senate leaders will be able to meet a self-imposed July 4 deadline for passing their health legislation. (Hackman, 6/13)

Senate Democrats are introducing legislation that would ban Republicans from bringing up their ObamaCare repeal and replace bill without holding a hearing on the bill. The legislation, known as the "No Hearing, No Vote Act," would require a bill being passed under reconciliation — the fast-track process being used to repeal and replace ObamaCare — to be voted on by at least one committee and have had at least one hearing. (Carney, 6/13)

Senate Democrats on Tuesday assailed Republican leaders' closed-door efforts to craft legislation to overhaul the U.S. health care system, calling it “legislative malpractice” and using Republican leaders’ own statements from years past to make their point. While GOP members routinely criticize the manner in which Democrats passed the 2010 health law on a strictly party-line vote, there are stark differences between that process and the current one. (Williams, 6/13)

Debates over press freedom and secret deliberations of healthcare legislation roiled the US Senate Tuesday, indicating signs of strain about public scrutiny within a bastion of American democracy. Republicans who control the Senate Rules Committee abruptly banned TV reporters from conducting videotaped interviews and filming in Capitol corridors without advanced permission — then, after an outcry, appeared to quickly back down. (Herndon and McGrane, 6/13)

Reporters complained on Tuesday that they were no longer allowed to interview senators in the Capitol without prior approval of the Senate Rules Committee. ... Members of Congress who don’t wish to participate are free to continue walking or turn down interview requests. (Welsh, 6/13)