Yesterday, President Trump put his finger on whom to blame for the failed Republican plan to repeal and replace Obamacare: Not him. Not them.
“We’re not going to own it. I’m not going to own it,” he said. “I can tell you the Republicans are not going to own it.”
This game of legislative “not it” might not have gone over too well with the Donald Trump of four years ago. After the president’s comments, some Twitter historians cracked open the volume of Trump Tweets That Haven’t Aged Well, presenting his thoughts on leadership from 2013: “Leadership: Whatever happens, you’re responsible. If it doesn’t happen, you’re responsible.”
Leadership: Whatever happens, you’re responsible. If it doesn’t happen, you’re responsible.
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) November 8, 2013
On CNN, Anderson Cooper referenced the tweet in comparing Trump’s “not going to own it” to Harry S. Truman’s “the buck stops here.” “He’s not going to own it, he says now, but four years ago as a citizen he said something very different indeed,” said Cooper. “What a difference four years can make.”
On Monday, Senate majority leader Mitch McConnell stuck a fork in the Senate’s Better Care Reconciliation, saying, “Regretfully, it’s now apparent that the effort to repeal and immediately replace the failure of Obamacare will not be successful.”
McConnell then said the Senate would vote on repealing Obamacare without replacing it. That was DOA when three Republican senators said they opposed it.
The president made his non-ownership declaration and said, “Let Obamacare fail. It will be a lot easier.”
On Wednesday afternoon, he revised his position in favor of another repeal and replace bill.
As NBC’s Garrett Haake tweeted, that brings the total number of positions Trump has held on the bill this week to four: 1) Repeal and replace; 2) Repeal now, replace later; 3) Let Obamacare fail; 4) Repeal and replace again, but differently this time. It’s unclear who will own the latest one.
