Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., just shared a small, but significant detail about ongoing congressional negotiations over healthcare reform that underscores why there will never be a significant bipartisan solution to the problem.
During a CNN debate on Monday night, Graham revealed that Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., has negotiated by telling Republicans, “Don’t even come in the room until you take repeal off the table.” The South Carolina senator said Democrats are “doubling down” on the system established by Obamacare. “There’s no amount of money in the world to save it,” Graham asserted, further arguing, “it’s not working and it’s never going to work.”
“We need to find a better way,” he concluded. Schumer refusing to even come to the negotiation table until Republicans scrap reform bills that make any efforts to repeal, including the fairly innovative Graham-Cassidy bill that leaves much of Obamacare’s framework in place, is very telling.
With Democrats insistent upon preserving Obamacare and Republicans firmly convinced “there’s no amount of money in the world to save it,” it’s just not possible to build a bipartisan coalition that agrees on a solution. Graham explicitly said as much later in the debate.
Addressing his friend Sen. John McCain’s, R-Ariz., decision not to support the Graham-Cassidy legislation, the senator noted that McCain believed solutions to healthcare reform must be bipartisan. “The difference between John and myself,” Graham explained, “is I really don’t see much space here, and if I thought I did, I would tell you otherwise.”
He’s right.
Sure, there may be quick fixes to the existing system around which reformers are capable of building bipartisan support. But with Democrats not willing to make significant changes to Obamacare, and Republicans positive that making significant changes is the only way to fix the system, there is simply not enough common ground to move forward
Emily Jashinsky is a commentary writer for the Washington Examiner.
