Donald Trump just made sure that health care will decide the 2020 election



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"The Ministry of Justice has determined that the general opinion of the district court has reached the right conclusion and will support it on appeal," said Kerri Kupec, spokesperson for the Ministry of Justice.

This decision, which surprised even many of Trump's allies, once again put the issue of health care at the center of the political debate, and virtually made the 2020 elections – like those of 2018, 2016, 2014, 2012 and 2010 – – will turn on the ACA.

It's a puzzling decision for Trump, who spent most of Monday's day in broad daylight, according to Attorney General Bill Barr, in the report of Special Advocate Robert Mueller, who was about as favorable as the president might have hoped: The special advocate has not established that, as part of Trump's election campaign, the government had plotted with the Russian government during the election's election interference. 2016 and that there was not enough evidence to allow Barr to establish a charge of obstructing justice against the president.

Switching the debate on the national debate between Russia and health care so quickly would be risky in all circumstances, but is particularly problematic since (a) the last five elections have shown that people care a lot about care b) getting rid of Obamacare is not a very popular point of view with the American public.

In a survey conducted in February by the Kaiser Family Foundation on the ACA, 50% approved it, while 37% disapproved. In fact, since President Barack Obama stepped down in January 2017, his legislative accomplishment – and the one that bears his name – has become increasingly popular. According to Kaiser data, since May 2017, more people have endorsed Obamacare than disapprove of it – a radical change from most of the previous five years, when the law was constantly underwater in terms of approval. Most of the provisions of the law that have long been the most popular – allowing children to stay on the insurance of their parents until the age of 26, no discrimination on the part of companies insurance due to pre-existing conditions of a patient – remain in effect. The least popular provision – the individual mandate that forced everyone in the country to benefit from some health care – was eliminated by Congressional Republicans (and Trump) in their 2017 tax law.
These figures explain why Democrats in the House broadcast hundreds and hundreds of television commercials in the mid-term elections of 2018, claiming that the Republicans, had they succeeded, would have completely eliminated Obamacare. "Republicans will do everything in their power to deflect attention from their votes and health care for Americans," said Nancy Pelosi (D-California), minority leader in the Chamber of Deputies in the days leading up to the mid-term. And after the democrats took control of the House in 2018, Pelosi was just as clear. "Health care was on the ballot, and health care won," she said.
The data backs Pelosi's position. More than 4 out of 10 voters in 2018 said health care was their number one priority in the polls, according to exit polls. The Democrats won these voters by 52 points. 52!
This considerable advantage for Democrats reflects the extent to which the political landscape has addressed the issue over the past decade. Opposition to what many conservatives saw as a huge drift by the government over what should be better managed by the private market led the Republicans to take control of the House midway through 2010. In 2012, public opinion on the law was somewhat stabilized and Obama was re-elected relatively easily. Two years later, however, despite the problems of implementation and the infamous / infamous backtracking "if you love your health care plan, you can keep it," Republicans once again opposed their opposition to the ACA and got more seats in Congress. In the 2016 presidential election, Trump is explicitly committed to a plan to repeal and replace the ACA. In 2018, Democrats were able to capitalize on the fact that House Republicans had approved a repeal and replacement of the package that was never passed because it failed in a late vote in the Senate.
Trump's decision to choose this fight right now is hard to understand. There is no doubt that his base hate Obamacare and would like to see him disappear. And that he thinks that at least some of his win in 2016 – and maybe his chances of being re-elected in 2020 – depends on his ability to remove the most visible from his predecessor. At rallies that took place during the 2018 campaign, Trump repeated the story of John McCain's decision to vote against Obamacare's so-called "lean abrogation", a line that has always attracted Of the late Arizona senator on the crowd. .

Trump spent the first two years of his presidency playing with his hardcore base – and, viewed in this light, the decision to reconquer the ACA fight makes sense. But Trump will not win a second term solely on the basis of his base. And by choosing the scabies Obamacare, Trump gives energy and ignites the Democrats and many independents. And it's a major political mistake.

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