Scott Brown’s 2010 election to the U.S. Senate was a major moment for opponents of what was to become President Barack Obama’s health care law. Brown ran as a Republican in Massachusetts in a special election to replace the late liberal lion Ted Kennedy, and his improbable victory there came in no small part thanks to the promise he offered to deny Senate Democrats the filibuster-proof majority they needed to pass the president’s bill.
While Senator Brown was unable to stop Democratic leader Harry Reid from using procedural loopholes to pass the bill anyway, his election demonstrated Republicans had the wind of popular opinion at their backs as they fought against the Democratic agenda on health care. So it was jarring to hear the frontrunner for the Republican nomination for president say just six years after Brown’s win that health care is among the “top three functions” of the federal government. Even more jarring is that among Trump’s most prominent supporters is Brown himself.
Asked by a questioner at CNN’s town hall event Tuesday night to name the top three functions of the United States government, Trump mentioned “security” several times. “I would also say health care, I would also say education,” Trump added, a statement he would repeat later in his answer.
“The government can lead it but it should be privately done,” Trump said, when prompted by CNN’s Anderson Cooper to clarify his position. “It should be privately done so that health care, in my opinion, we should probably have—we have to have private health care.” If that sounds a lot like how Obamacare works, it’s because it is.
Reached by email, Brown seemed unperturbed by Trump’s philosophical unorthodoxy. “There are many different obligations of the federal government,” said the former senator. “The difference between this administration and what Mr. Trump and other Republicans believe, is that there is too much of the federal government interfering with states’ rights and our daily lives. So I think it’s appropriate to review that role and hopefully strike a balance.”
Pressed about Trump’s stated view that health care was among the top functions of the government itself, Brown demurred. “You would have to get clarification from him. I know he is against Obamacare, wants competition, in an effort in driving prices down, allowing for cross border competition, more transparency in pricing. I would suggest you reach out to them to have your questions answered,” he said.
Brown also reiterated his own position on health care.
“If you recall I believe that states should develop their own plans to take care of their own citizens, not the one size fits all approach that Obamacare uses,” he said.
While the exact parameters of Trump’s own health care proposals are sketchy, he has in past presidential debates praised the single-payer, centralized systems in places like Scotland and Canada.
