Trump, Ryan moving on to tax reform effort with major trade implications

Speaker Paul Ryan says he understands and shares President Donald Trump’s frustration with the House Freedom Caucus. “The Freedom Caucus is all of that and that’s what we are moving forward on”. At a recent town hall meeting, he told constituents he would vote against Ryan’s bill, though his office stated prior to the scheduled vote last Friday that he wasn’t a definite “no”.

President Trump kicked off Friday morning by picking a fight with the far-right House Freedom Caucus for not giving the wildly unpopular American Health Care Act the votes it needed, ultimately causing Speaker Ryan to pull the doomed piece of legislation.

In the afternoon he singled out three of the group’s leaders by name, urging them to “get on board”.

A House Freedom Caucus member is defending the group’s opposition to the failed GOP health care bill.

“You can’t allow 30 to 35 people to hold the whole Republican conference hostage”, said Rep. Peter King, R-N.Y. and ally of Ryan. I am still talking to the Freedom Caucus.

Asked during a briefing whether Trump’s tweet about the Freedom Caucus was a “divide-and-conquer” strategy, White House spokesman Sean Spicer said: “No, it’s a math strategy, which is to get to 216”, the number of votes now needed to pass House legislation.

With midterm elections coming next year, Wasson said he planned to vote again for his congressman, Rep. Rod Blum of Dubuque – a sentiment echoed by other voters whose representatives opposed the bill. He announced his support, donned a Texas flag tie and walked to the House floor to give a speech.

He added that Mulvaney made it clear he did not want to deliver the message but did so at Trump’s insistence. We want to see lower prices.

But Republicans took a safety, and Trump’s biggest campaign promise sputtered 5 yards from the goal line. After GOP leaders agreed to rip them out, moderates walked.

Labrador responded to Trump on Twitter that, “Freedom Caucus stood with u when others ran”. “It may be hard for the speaker”, he says, “but it also is the way legislation used to be done around here”.

Nationwide, an Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research poll released Wednesday found that 62 per cent disapprove of the way Trump is handling health care, his worst rating among seven issues the poll tested, including the economy, foreign policy and immigration.

If this Republican Congress allows the flawless to be the enemy of the good, I worry we’ll push the president into working with Democrats.

President Donald Trump isn’t hiding his displeasure with the House Freedom Caucus almost a week after it helped to defeat his plan to repeal and replace Obamacare, but it remains to be seen whether his anger will be felt beyond Twitter.

Despite the tensions boiling over between the White House and the Freedom Caucus, Sen. One of the group’s co-founders, Rick Gates, left last week amid renewed reports about his firm’s past work on behalf of Russian clients.

(The Hill) Rep. Justin Amash (R-Mich.), a member of the House Freedom Caucus, fired back Thursday at President Trump’s threat to “fight” conservative members in 2018, turning Trump’s campaign slogan around on him.

There are about three dozen members of the Freedom Caucus, and majority were elected or re-elected comfortably in solidly Republican districts.

“We better get it right now, figure out how we’re going to work together to do what we told the American people we were going to do, and not just pass a bill that no one supports”.

Ryan enforced that message in the CBS interview, suggesting that Trump’s patience was not infinite and he could be tempted to work with the other side if Republicans refuse to implement his agenda.