Trump’s White House Hits A New Level Of Crazy By Telling The Senate What They Can Vote On

The Trump White House has gone off the rails and is now trying to tell the Senate what they are allowed to vote on.

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Transcript via CNN’s State Of The Union:

TAPPER: Let me return to health care.

Following this week’s collapse of Republican efforts to repeal Obamacare and on occasion replace it, the Senate majority leader, Mitch McConnell, said he’s ready to move on to other issues.

President Trump seems pretty stuck on the issue. He’s been tweeting about it all weekend long, including this morning.

This is what he tweeted yesterday — quote — “Unless the Republican senators are total quitters, repeal and replace is not dead. Demand another vote before voting on any other bill.”

Is this official White House policy, that nothing should be voted on in Congress, not even the debt ceiling, before the Senate votes again on health care?

MULVANEY: Well, I think — yes. And I think what you’re seeing there is the president simply reflecting the mood of the people. Go and poll the American public and find out what the most important issue is to them right now, and it’s health care.

So, in the White House’s view, they can’t move on in the Senate. In the people’s view, they should move on in the Senate. They should stay and work and figure out a way to solve this problem.

Keep in mind, you’re talking about something they promised to do for seven years. You can’t promise folks you’re going to do something for seven years, and then not do it. So, in addition to this policy consideration, you do have Obamacare. It is failing. It is hurting people.

So, to not change it allows that to go forward. That’s a policy consideration. At the same time, you have the political consideration that you promised folks you would do this for seven years. You cannot go back on that. So, yes, they need to stay, they need to work, they need to pass something.

And I think that’s not only official White House position on this right now. It’s sort of the national attitude towards it.

The national attitude on this is that Republicans should leave Obamacare alone, and they want nothing to do with Trumpcare or any other Republican health care plan. The idea that the White House thinks that they can set the Senate calendar and determine what the Senate votes on is hysterical. Mick Mulvaney was in the House. He knows that the White House is making an absurd threat.

If Trump wants to make sure that Senate Republicans never vote on health care again, he is handling this issue the correct way. The Trump administration has no respect for checks and balances, or the US Constitution.

The White House doesn’t get to tell the Senate what to do. That is not how any of this works. The Trump White House is nuts, and they’re trying to rewrite constitutional checks and balances because they are dysfunctional and unable to govern

Jason Easley

Jason is the managing editor. He is also a White House Press Pool and a Congressional correspondent for PoliticusUSA. Jason has a Bachelor’s Degree in Political Science. His graduate work focused on public policy, with a specialization in social reform movements.

Awards and  Professional Memberships

Member of the Society of Professional Journalists and The American Political Science Association