Trump’s Flip-Flops Threaten Bipartisan Obamacare Stabilization Deal

President Donald Trump speaks during an event to announce the nomination of Kirstjen Nielsen to be Secretary of Homeland Security, in the East Room of the White House, Thursday, Oct. 12, 2017, in Washington. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci)
President Donald Trump speaks during an event to announce the nomination of Kirstjen Nielsen to be secretary of Homeland Security, in the East Room of the White House, Thursday, Oct. 12, 2017, in Washington. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci)
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Less than an hour after Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-TN) told a room full of reporters that President Trump had called him Wednesday morning to offer encouragement for Alexander’s bipartisan deal to stabilize Obamacare’s individual market, the mercurial president took to Twitter and seemingly reversed his position.

A few hours later, he flipped again, telling reporters: “Lamar Alexander’s working on it very hard. If something can happen, that’s fine.”

The conflicting tweets and remarks are leaving Washington utterly befuddled as to the President’s view on the deal, contradicting his previous statements—some less than 24 hours ago—supporting and taking credit for Alexander’s negotiations with Democrats on the bill.

In a press conference Tuesday afternoon with the Greek Prime Minister, Trump said “we have been involved” in the deal-making process, and characterized the proposal as a “short-term deal” that will help pave the way to repealing Obamacare down the road.

Then, in a speech to the Heritage Foundation Tuesday night, Trump said he “commends” the bipartisan negotiations “to provide much-needed relief for the American people.” But Trump also seemed to hedge somewhat in the Heritage speech: “While I commend the bipartisan work done by Senators Alexander and Murray — and I do commend it — I continue to believe Congress must find a solution to the Obamacare mess instead of providing bailouts to insurance companies.”

On Wednesday morning, Alexander said President Trump called him to voice tentative support. It was the third positive call in the last two weeks that Alexander has gotten from the President on the issue.

“He called me to say that he wanted to be encouraging,” Alexander said. “He intends to review it carefully to see if he wants to add anything to it. And number three, he’s still for block grants, but sometime later.”

Alexander then spoke in praise of Trump, saying he made the deal possible and displayed keen political and policy knowledge.

“The parlor game around Washington is that the President doesn’t know what he’s doing. But on health care, he probably does,” he said. “He is for bipartisan agreements for the short term, a bridge so that people are not hurt.”

But in a repeat of the pattern from the White House earlier this summer, when Republicans were attempting to rally the votes on a series of bills to repeal the Affordable Care Act, the President’s contradictions, flip-flops and incoherent message are threatening the ability of Congress to pass a bill, and leave in doubt whether he would sign it if it actually reached his desk.

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Notable Replies

  1. You don’t need a Psychology textbook to see through this tactic by Trump. You need a textbook on Negotiation. His “first yes, then no, then yes” is known in negotiating parlance as the shady practice of bland withdrawal.
    The Negotiator works out an apparent deal with his adversary or counterpart, and causes tthe latter to sell the deal to superiors or otherwise get invested in it. Then, as close to the originally planned finalization as possible, the “Trump” figure pulls out with no explanation, then returns to milk the reopened negotiation for an even better deal.

    It’s a completely inappropriate tactic for governance or any other negotiation between long-term participants, but of course that doesn’t bother Dear Leader.

    Note that the title includes “Art”. The book is essentially an encyclopedia of techniques, legit and shady.

    This is a great book. As an aside, remember, back when celebrity endorsements were less prevalent, all the business deals Art Linkletter had going–the game of “Life”, his Bowling Alley, etc?
    If I recall correctly, Nirenberg was his advisor.

  2. Repulsive oaf says what?

  3. Or perhaps the fuckin’ moron may simply have gotten a call from Bannon…

  4. GOP has no leverage here. This is Mulvaney and the hard line morons trying to torpedo this deal. This deal would pass the Senate and House, but like the Gang of 8 immigration bill, I’ll bet the GOP leadership conspires to not bring it to the floor in 1 or both houses of Congress.

    Dems have no need to wait for a deal here. If the GOP walks away, the Dems will win control of Congress, House + Senate. After that 60 minutes report, Bredesen is going to get into that Senate race vs. Blackburn and he’l beat her. Also have a good shot in NV and AZ with a very good chance of holding all incumbent D seats. In the House, I think we can have a 2006 style run.

    The campaign is simple: If you give the GOP power they will take your money, take away your health care, and eat you. Vote Dem.

  5. Notice in the article this AM Nicole was sayng Bannon was “throwing his weight” behind Flake’s challenger?
    Hevvv-veeee…

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