Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell did it again, though this time his embarrassment will be slightly less public and humiliating. This time, Trumpcare won't go to the floor for a vote that is destined to fail.
Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC), flanked by Senate GOP leaders, promised the measure would pass eventually, but acknowledged it won’t happen by the Sept. 30 deadline.
“We’re on the path to pass Graham-Cassidy-Heller-Johnson. It’s not a question of if, but when,” he insisted. “With a process that gives more intention and time we will repeal Obamacare with a block grant.”
Graham’s co-author, a visibly downcast Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-LA), then confirmed to reporters: “We don’t have the votes.”
Then Cassidy said "Let's engage together and find a bipartisan path forward." Which is clearly ridiculous because Democrats will never in a million years agree to replacing our healthcare with block grants. And because McConnell is plotting the next thing, tying Obamacare repeal to tax cuts and doing it with just Republican votes. That's another hare-brained scheme from McConnell, one House tax leaders are most definitely not on board with.
Even when he's breaking all the rules and norms of the Senate, when he's got the deck stacked with a Republican House and White House, McConnell is incapable of governing. He's proven he can't even pull his own conference together to create legislation that can pass, much less work with the whole Senate or the House or the White House. He has yet to have a significant legislative accomplishment, and thank whatever higher powers there might be for that or we'd all be uninsured without a safety net.
Obamacare repeal will be back, because these guys just don't know what else to do with themselves, but that doesn't mean it's ever going to work. Not just because McConnell can't make it happen, but because this failure is going to heat up Trump's war against him. Out-and-out civil war in the GOP is going to make McConnell an even bigger failure.
By the way, thanks and congratulations to you all of you who’ve kept Republican Senate offices’ phones ringing off the hook. You’re making McConnell’s job even harder, and right now there is no greater calling.
