6 reasons ‘TrumpCare’ flatlined

The Affordable Care Act (ACA) may be on life support, but the American Health Care Act (ACHA) is deader than a doornail. My guess is President Obama lit a celebratory cigar when he learned that ObamaCare still lived while President’s Trump’s healthcare proposal crashed and burned on Friday.

Both Trump and Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) deserve much of the blame. But what did they do wrong? The GOP has a president, and control of both the House and the Senate, but Republicans couldn’t get their version of healthcare done.

Here are the results of the autopsy on AHCA.

1. Trump made a rookie mistake.

Chuck Todd of NBC News thinks the new president made a rookie mistake in making his first legislative initiative a proposal that took something away from the American people instead of a bill like infrastructure that gave people something.

Back in 2010, when Congress debated the merits of ObamaCare, many Republicans argued that it was necessary to kill the proposal in its crib. They were right. Once you give people something, it’s hard to take it away.

Especially when it means more than 20 million Americans would lose the health insurance they got from the Affordable Care Act.

2. Republicans failed to plan.

Since ObamaCare became law in 2010, House Republicans voted to repeal it 59 times without offering an alternative. Finally, after seven years, Ryan came up with an alternative and it was an unmitigated disaster for the GOP.

“TrumpCare” — or maybe it’s better called “RyanCare” — was a slapdash effort. The proposal looked like something scribbled on a cocktail napkin after a long night at the bar.

Ryan had seven years to figure healthcare out, but he came up empty. With all that time, you’d think the GOP would have come up with a rock-solid plan.

3. Right-wing Republicans ran amok.

Ryan didn’t have any more luck dealing with the ultra-conservative Freedom Caucus than his predecessor as Speaker, John Boehner (R-Ohio). Some are now demanding Ryan’s removal after he badly mishandled his version of healthcare reform.

The reason why it took the Speaker seven years to propose an alternative to ACA was because he wasn’t able to develop a proposal that both the Freedom Caucus and moderately conservative Republicans in swing districts could support.

The only thing that would have satisfied the right-wing caucus would have been the complete withdrawal of the federal government from the healthcare arena.

A Freedom Caucus member, Tom Massie (R-Ky.) summed up the thinking of caucus members when he described the AHCA as “a stinking pile of garbage.” He went on to say, “I think the [American Health Care Act] was written by the same people that wrote ObamaCare.”

On Friday — like Obama — Boehner probably celebrated when he heard that his successor’s healthcare plan went down in flames. The Freedom Caucus drove Boehner out of the Speaker’s chair and the caucus may do the same to Ryan.

4. The president dissed his base.

Trump should have danced with the ones who brung him, as the old saying goes. The president danced his way into White House with white working-class support. But once he got to the White House, he waltzed with wealthy Americans instead.

TrumpCare would have eliminated health insurance for millions of his supporters so that wealthy Americans could get a tax cut. The bill would have cruelly taken away healthcare from millions of men, women and children who couldn’t afford anything else.

As Rep. Jim McGovern (D-Mass.) told The New York Times, “It’s so cartoonishly malicious that I can picture someone twirling their mustache as they drafted it in their secret Capitol lair last night.”

5. Democrats and progressives stood united.

Democratic unity, and division among Republicans, sealed the AHCA’s fate. Democrats hung tight and progressive activists kicked butt.

House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) deserves some credit for the AHCA’s demise. Ryan couldn’t even round up one Democratic vote for AHCA, which forced him to rely on the “Scorched Earth Caucus.”

Calls, tweets and emails to members of Congress ran heavily against AHCA thanks to the efforts of many progressive groups. This strengthened the resolve of congressional Democrats.

The death of TrumpCare also indicates that there are deep divisions within the Republican Party. Democrats and progressives working together will continue to exploit the great divide within the GOP.

6. Trump ignored checks and balances.

It’s obvious that when Trump entered the White House, he thought he could do almost anything he pleased. The new president had to learn about checks and balances the hard way.

First, his travel ban is blocked by federal judges. Then his own party kills his healthcare bill in the House.

And even if his reform bill had squeezed through the House, the plan was dead on arrival in the Senate, where several GOP senators had already said publicly that they would oppose the House bill.

Last week, the president told congressional Republicans that they had to vote on the bill as is or he wouldn’t sign any healthcare reform bill down the line.

Massie tweeted “If Exec branch tells the Legislative branch ‘when 2 vote’ ‘how to vote’ and ‘what it will b allowed 2 work on if vote fails’ is that a republic?”

It’s back to the drawing board for the GOP. The good news is that millions of Americans can sleep soundly knowing they still have a backup if they suffer a severe injury or serious illness.

At least for now.

Brad Bannon is a Democratic pollster and CEO of Bannon Communications Research. (He is not related in any way to the alt-right leader and Trump adviser Stephen Bannon.) Campaigns and Elections magazine called him a “mover and shaker” in the political consulting industry. He hosts and contributes regularly to the nationally syndicated progressive talk show, “The Leslie Marshall Show.” Bannon is also a political analyst for CLTV, the cable news station of the Chicago Tribune and WGN-TV. He is also a senior adviser to, and editor of, the blog at MyTiller.com, the social media network for politics. Contact him at brad@bannoncr.com.

The views of contributors are their own and not the views of The Hill.