Healthcare battle a real PR minefield for Trump and Congress
If there’s a bigger hot-button issue in American politics than the Affordable Care Act that would be news to millions who either love or love to hate President Obama’s signature legislation. While there’s no doubt the law has issues, and implementation went about as smooth as a dirt road through the jungle, the biggest issue faced by both the Obama and Trump administrations is public relations related to the issue. Congress has attempted to act on the Act in the past, but those bills were little more than symbolic gestures. They knew Obama would always veto any bills that sought to repeal or replace the ACA. But things are different now. Trump spent a large portion of his campaign promising to “repeal and replace” Obamacare. How he would do that and what a replacement plan would look like was rarely discussed. For his followers – and his detractors – it was enough that Trump was talking about Doing Something about the bill. Millions of Americans blame the Act for massive hikes in insurance premiums, while tens of millions have health coverage they would not be able to get except for the Act. It’s an unsustainable détente. Some Americans literally can’t afford insurance, and others literally can’t live without it. So, which side should Congress and the incoming President choose? Who gets the benefits, and who gets the shaft? That’s exactly how any action on this Act is being framed, an Us v. Them narrative that doesn’t ask or even hope for a more nuanced approach to an unsustainable financial problem. Worse, for lawmakers trying to determine what to do based on public consensus … there really isn’t much to go on. While only one in four Americans want President-elect Trump to