A New Fight Over Health Care
TRUMP: Obamacare is a disaster. It's too expensive by far. People can't afford it and the deductible is horrible. I understand health care now especially very well. A lot of people don't understand it. We are going to be the Republicans, the party of great health care.</s>MATTINGLY: President Trump shocked even members of his own party this week by launching a new war on Obamacare. His Justice Department took new action to have the entire law struck down with no plan in place about what would actually come next. Here is why this is a fight that worries a lot of Republicans and energizes a lot of Democrats. First let's take a look at a couple of pieces of Obamacare that have remained very popular even throughout some of the back and forth over Capitol Hill over the course of, let's say, the last decade. Preexisting conditions protections. This was the downfall essentially of the Republican repeal and replace effort in 2017. Kids staying on their parents' plans until 26. Limits out- of-pocket costs, no lifetime caps, no co-pay, no deductible for physicals. This applies to all of Americans and underscores not just the political liability but also the system-wide liability if there is a law that's struck down with no replacement in place. Now take a look at, at least according to the Urban Institute, the biggest jumps in the uninsured rate if Obamacare is repealed. Pay attention to where some of these states actually are. Montana, Iowa, Arkansas, Louisiana, Kentucky, West Virginia. What do those states align with? Pennsylvania. States President Trump won when you look at the red here back in 2016. These are red states or in the case of Iowa, Pennsylvania, kind of swing states that the president won on his pathway to more than 270 electoral votes. This matters politically electorally along with the enormous impact on the policy side of things. This all comes as Obamacare's approval rating, at least at the current moment, is as high as it's ever been. 50 percent approve of the law compared to 39 percent who disapprove. Think about where this law has been over the court of the last 10 years, 50 percent maybe back in 2010, 2011 would be stunning. That's where it sits right now. However, you want a rationale for why the president is considering this fight, why is the administration or at least some in the administration are urging this fight? Take a look at this middle number right here. Of Republicans, 75 percent still disapprove of the law. The Republican base has never moved on this issue. The Republican base still wants a fight on this issue. The president is willing to fight on this issue. Guess who else is? The Democrats. 80 percent approve. And nothing unifies the Democratic Party as we saw throughout the first term of the president -- the first two years of the president's time in office -- in the midterms quite like Obamacare.</s>PELOSI: The GOP will never stop trying to destroy the Affordable Health Care of America's families.</s>SEN. KAMALA HARRIS (D), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: I feel very strongly that supposed leaders should stop playing politics with people's public health.</s>JULIAN CASTRO (D), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: This administration and the Republican Party want to go back to the bad old days where people couldn't get health insurance if they had a preexisting condition.</s>SEN. CHUCK SCHUMER (D), MINORITY LEADER: The president wants to go back to repeal and replace again? Make our day.</s>MATTINGLY: I'll get to how this has kind of unified Democrats which at least on the campaign trail have been splitting a little bit on this issue in a moment. But, Seung Min, I want to start with you because you have a headline in the "Washington Post" that says, "For Trump's party of health care, there is no health care plan." And that's not hyperbole, that's very true. And you've got the on-the-record quote to back that up. What did you find in reporting this out?</s>KIM: Well, I mean, not that there's just no plan. There's no plans to actually get a plan together which is the problem for Republicans right now. And look, first of all, go to the committee chairman who would be in charge of writing any health care bills. Both of them, just when you ask them, they're like, we're doing something else, we're focused on lowering the price of prescription drugs, we're focused on bipartisan efforts to reduce health care costs in other ways. And Mitch McConnell has no intention of, you know, helping Trump along in any way to become -- to help Republicans become the party of health care. I mean, there's no plan to put a working group together. He's told Politico that, you know, the president can happily work with the speaker if he wants to do this because, again, as you showed in your poll numbers before, this is not a good issue for Republicans. Now they may be forced into that position if the Supreme Court -- if and when this case does go up there, get up there, strikes down the law. But that is a circumstance that is at least a month if not at least a year away.</s>MATTINGLY: Yes. I want to tick through some of the quotes from this week which was just a goldmine in talking to Republican senators for those of us who cover Capitol Hill, and it goes, starting with Mitch McConnell. You mentioned it, Jeff Zeleny, mentioned it in the last block. "I look forward to seeing what the president is proposing and what he can work out with the speaker." Let me translate that.</s>MARTIN: Yes.</s>MATTINGLY: It's not going to happen. John Cornyn, "What they need to do is tell us what their plans are." Roy Blunt, "I assume the president wouldn't have brought this up if there wasn't a White House proposal." Lisa Murkowski, "Do we have a plan? What's our plan? I guess we'll find out." That's a not-so subtle way of saying this ain't happening any time soon.</s>MARTIN: And it's such a slight to the White House because not only are they suggesting that, you know, they're going to wait for the administration to offer a plan, they're kind of mocking Trump, too, because they know he doesn't have a plan. And they're kind of saying, we'll wait for his plan. And he's down there talking about we're going to be the party of great health care which obviously it's a slogan, not a plan. So, I mean, those statements are filled with such contempt, contempt that they can never fully articulate for all the obvious reasons that we know politically. But they really capture the frustration of his own party with him because he's putting them in a tough spot. They don't want to talk about Obamacare again.</s>ZELENY: Because now it's taking something away from people. It's taking something away from people like what they have.</s>MARTIN: That's the issue.</s>ZELENY: So all their constituents, all their voters, they actually like most of Obamacare or at least parts of Obamacare. So there is no conversation about fixing it. I mean, that's one thing we have really not heard from either side over this 10-year debate. This has been going on for so long. There's very few discussions. I wonder what Senator Mitt Romney has to say about this. I mean, he of course was the governor of Massachusetts, essentially had the same plan.</s>MARTIN: Yes.</s>ZELENY: So one thing missing out of all of this is actually any discussion of how to improve the existing Obamacare.</s>MARTIN: Well, it's a great --</s>JOHNSON: You know --</s>MARTIN: Go ahead. Yes.</s>JOHNSON: So these senators are saying this for two reasons. The first is, in a, quote-unquote, "normal White House," you'd have -- where the White House was pushing repeal of Obamacare, you'd have the White House pushing a proposal, an alternative proposal. Here, acting chief of staff Mick Mulvaney pitched the president on pushing this path saying it would put pressure on Congress to do that, but there is simply no appetite in Congress to go down this road. So that's why this flopped. But second and I think less discussed is that this lawsuit that the president has come out and backed is seen by conservative legal scholars as really a long-shot lawsuit that has very little legal merit. And so most Republicans think there's very little chance that this lawsuit will be upheld in the Supreme Court. And so ultimately I think most Republicans believe this will be much ado about nothing because it's unlikely the Supreme Court will actually invalidate all of Obamacare. It has failed to do so once before. John Roberts upheld the individual mandate. And so I think most Republicans believe, you know, we're having a conversation that will amount to nothing.</s>MATTINGLY: Right. And on that point, their frustration, take a look at -- there's a poll out about Dems being kind of divided about whether or not they want to fix Obamacare or whether they want to push Medicare for all. We've seen it, on the campaign trail, 44 percent want to improve and protect the ACA, 46 percent want to pass national Medicare for all. You talked to Mitch McConnell.</s>MARTIN: Yes.</s>MATTINGLY: Mitch McConnell's team, this is what they want to fight on, that's for sure.</s>MARTIN: This what drives them crazy because for the last three months McConnell folks thought, OK, we have now gotten past the failure to replace the ACA. But now we have a gift in our laps because the Democrats feeling pressure from their progressive base are trying to go further and create single payer. We can just feast on that, and politically, you know, just focus entirely on not what we fail to do, but what they want to do that is unpopular with large segments of the American public when you break down the polls. And instead of doing that, they're now back to this question about what to do with the ACA instead of making Bernie Sanders the sort of face of the Democratic Party and his plan for universal health care.</s>MATTINGLY: Yes, it's going to be really interesting, one, to see whether or not this actually moves forward in any way. Obviously the legal issues as well are going to be fascinating to watch. But also, if this remains an issue more than one week, or else, if the working group and the health care -- party of health care disappears over the course of the next couple of weeks. We'll see. All right. Next, Democrats strategy in the Mueller report after that report is actually submitted.