Before Republicans captured Washington, the unyielding conservatives in the House Freedom Caucus were a nuisance. Now, with the GOP in control of the House, Senate, and White House, they’re a roadblock to success.
There’s a simple reason for this: They insist on what cannot be achieved. Anything short of that, such as the bill to repeal and replace Obamacare, triggers fierce opposition by the group’s thirty or so members. And if they stick together, they can prevent Republican legislation from passing, as they did at least initially in the case of killing Obamacare.
That’s not all. The Freedom Caucus specializes in making things difficult for House speaker Paul Ryan. Its members treat this as a duty. They regard him as a member in good standing of the political establishment who’s been Washingtonized and is no longer a legitimate conservative.
It would hardly displease the caucus if some distance emerged between Ryan and President Trump, the wider the gap, the better. The Ryan-Trump relationship, nonexistent during last year’s campaign, improved once they began working together on a daily basis to promote the agenda they share. But it’s still brittle.
Which brings us to the American Health Care Act (AHCA), the measure to repeal and replace Obamacare that was drafted by Ryan and congressional leaders. The fact that it would eliminate most but not all of Obamacare is the source of the clash between Ryan and the Freedom Caucus.
The AHCA is designed to circumvent a Democratic filibuster in the Senate. That means it can sweep away only the parts of Obamacare dealing with spending and taxes. The broad framework of Obamacare would remain. By invoking a procedure known as “reconciliation,” the measure can pass by a simple majority—51 votes—with no filibuster allowed.
It’s a tedious and unexciting process that requires careful attention to something called the Byrd Rule, which is too arcane to explain. However, it has one advantage: It provides a path to Senate passage and the end of Obamacare. Indeed, it’s the only path.
Selling this to House Republicans is no easy task. Ryan could argue that the AHCA must be passed to meet the rules of the Senate. But appeasing big-shot senators is the last thing mere congressmen want to hear. Ryan hasn’t made that pitch in public.
But the other arguments for the bill aren’t much more compelling. Trump tried what has been dubbed the Tony Soprano approach when he spoke to the House GOP conference. He insinuated dissenters would be dealt with harshly, perhaps by his backing of primary challengers to those who vote no. This didn’t produce a slew of converts.
The president singled out the leader of the Freedom Caucus, Mark Meadows of North Carolina, and asked him to stand. “Oh, I’m gonna come after you,” Trump said. A readout from the event said, “Everyone laughed.” It didn’t note whether Meadows did.
When Freedom Caucus members came to the White House, Trump adviser Steve Bannon was quoted as offering this argument: “You all have to vote for this. We’ve got to do this. I know you don’t like it, but you have to vote for this.” His appeal didn’t work either.
The problem with the caucus members is not their conservative views. They tend to be ideological purists. The trouble comes from their insistence on ignoring political reality.
They want Obamacare to be repealed in one swoop, the whole program, including the expansion of Medicaid. But that has zero chance of beating a filibuster and gaining Senate approval. Nor would it slip through reconciliation. It’s a nonstarter, a path to nowhere, a dead end.
Yet the Freedom Caucus sticks with it as tenaciously as Democrats are glued to Obamacare itself. And they have attracted the support of important elements of the conservative hierarchy: the Koch brothers, Americans for Prosperity, the Club for Growth, Heritage Action, FreedomWorks, and Republican senators Mike Lee and Rand Paul. Caucus members report that calls to their offices are lopsidedly against the Ryan-Trump plan.
They deserve credit for focusing on an overlooked aspect of that plan. While it would get rid of the mandate requiring everyone to buy health insurance, it would not dispose of the package of “essential health benefits.” Those consist of services every insurance policy must provide, including maternity and mental health care.
In talks at the White House, Trump agreed to get rid of this provision. But there’s a rub. It may not qualify under reconciliation, which suggests it’s probably a lost cause in the Senate.
In one sense, the Freedom Caucus has the upper hand over Trump and Ryan. Most of the members are in safely Republican districts and unlikely to be threatened by a primary opponent—that is, unless Trump drops in to campaign against them.
Trump has bigger things to worry about. Republicans have billed him as “the closer,” the fellow who knows how to negotiate and impose a deal. That turns out to be harder than Trump could have anticipated.
Were he to fail on his paramount issue, the president would suffer politically and practically. He would become less of a commanding figure, and progress toward enacting tax reform, infrastructure spending, trade deals, and immigration reform would be slowed. House Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi is already calling him “not ready” for the presidency.
Ryan, too, stands to suffer. Caucus Republicans are less afraid of him than they are of Trump. And these conservatives would be delighted to force him to step down. It would be a mistake, but they are adept at making mistakes.
And then there’s the Republican party. It’s been clamoring for repeal of Obamacare from the day it became law in 2010. Unpopular from the start, the health care law delivered the Republican takeover of the House in that year’s midterm election and was crucial to winning control of the Senate in the 2014 midterm.
Start over? It’s too late to devise a new formula for repeal and replace and it would be embarrassing to try. If Republicans don’t get it done in 2017, they may lose the House and possibly the Senate next year. In that case, the Freedom Caucus will have a lot to answer for.
Fred Barnes is executive editor of The Weekly Standard.
