President Trump got burned trusting Speaker Ryan on healthcare
President Donald Trump trusted Speaker of the House Paul Ryan (R-Wisc.) when he told him that he could deliver a healthcare bill that would pass the House without problems. President Trump got a bill that was total mess with opposition from both the Conservative Freedom Caucus as well as Centrists who come from the swing states that the president won by slim margins.
After spending most of the week doing all he could save Ryan’s plan last night President Trump had enough. The man who wrote The Art of the Deal, knows when to walk away from a bad one.
So, the White House told Congress they wanted a vote that make-or-break vote on health care legislation in the House, threatening to leave Obamacare in place and move on to other issues if Friday’s vote fails.
The risky move, part gamble and part threat, was presented to GOP lawmakers behind closed doors Thursday night after a long and intense day that saw a planned vote on the health care bill scrapped as the legislation remained short of votes amid cascading negotiations among conservative lawmakers, moderates and others.
For seven years now, House Republicans and their wealthy donors have been desperate to repeal the Affordable Care Act, which established the principle of universal coverage, and came with new taxes that hit the country’s top earners. To the likes of Ryan and Tom Price, who is now President Trump’s Secretary of Health and Human Services, the A.C.A. amounted to a new entitlement program, one that, over the years, was likely to get bigger and bigger.
After President Trump won the election, there were still some reasons to doubt whether Ryan and Price would get what they wanted—or, at least, whether they would get it this quickly. To be sure, Trump promised to repeal the A.C.A. during his campaign. But he also promised to renegotiate trade agreements, rebuild America’s decaying infrastructure, construct a wall across the southern border, crack down on Wall Street, and reduce taxes for corporations and the middle class.
This was always Ryan’s healthcare bill and now it totally belongs to him as President Trump is bailing on a bill that does not meet his campaign promises. Speaker Ryan can’t count on the support from President Trump because he betrayed his trust.
