The one thing that might prevent the Trump administration from doing more harm to our health care is the astounding pettiness of the people Donald Trump has put in charge of handling it. Politico reports that Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar and Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services head Seema Verma have been at each other's throats, which has supposedly "delayed the president's long-promised replacement proposal for Obamacare and disrupted other health care initiatives central to Trump's reelection campaign."
That's the story from administration officials, anyway. That there actually would be any effort at all to come up with a replacement plan is a stretch of the imagination. Other than tariffs and putting babies in cages, this administration hasn't cooked up any actual policies it had promised—see, for example, infrastructure. Likelier, the politicos around Trump are looking to place blame on someone other than Trump for being incompetent.
Which isn't to say that these two aren't capable of the ego clashes ascribed to them. The story goes that they are so competitive for Trump's favor they are sabotaging one another. Supposedly Verma had a plan ready to go this summer, but Azar killed it before she could put it in front of Trump. This is how petty it all is, Politico is told: "This fall, Azar blocked Verma from traveling with Trump on Air Force One from Washington to Florida in early October for the unveiling of a high-profile Medicare executive order—an initiative largely drawn up by Verma's agency—said six officials with knowledge of the episode, which played out over days." Verma supposedly had to go directly to White House staff to get on the plane.
Not surprisingly, "Azar's and Verma's camps are pointing the finger at one another" in private. Politico doesn't say it, but chances are good all the reporting that outlet has been doing on Verma's personal and very expensive PR campaign probably came from Azar's camp. Politico merely says that the reports "have exacerbated the tensions." They apparently fight over who gets to announce and take credit for initiatives, over hiring, over pretty much everything, if sources are to be believed. That includes Azar asserting his authority over Verma by repeatedly poaching her recruits.
"The amount of time spent dealing with things like this, and having to have these fights and have these issues, are time that could've been spent thinking of better drug pricing proposals or other ways to advance parts of the agenda," one health care official, not attributed to either camp, told Politico. Spokespeople for both Azar and Verma deny that there's any rivalry at all—which is about as believable as the idea that there would be a tremendous health care plan from Team Trump without it.
