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Congressional Republicans failed to repeal the Affordable Care Actso a former Trump volunteer wants to repeal his donations to the party.

Robert Heghmann is a former Trump campaign volunteer, and a sworn enemy of ObamaCare. In a lawsuit filed in Virginias Eastern District Court on Thursday, Heghmann says he and fellow Republicans had donated to the GOP with the understanding that the party would repeal the ACA once they took control of Congress.

But Republicans doomed repeal efforts last month left Heghmann feeling scammed. He accuses the party of running a racketeering and mail fraud scheme to rip off anti-ObamaCare donorsand he wants the GOP to return every donation it received since 2013.

Heghmann, 70, contributed well over $1,000 supporting Republican Party Events and Republican Candidates based upon the pledge... that if Republicans contributed money and votes to the Republican Party and Republicans successfully took control of the U.S. House of Representatives and the U.S. Senate, Republicans in Congress would Repeal and Replace Obamacare, he claims in his lawsuit.

(Federal Election Committee filings only list $750 in donations under Heghmanns name. Heghmann could not be reached for comment.)

Senate Republicans attempts to repeal the ACA last month were met with national outrage. Protesters risked arrest to demonstrate outside congressional offices. Republicans huddled to draft a repeal bill in secret and moved to proceed on the mystery bill, before their efforts crashed and burned in a late-night vote. But the GOPs failure wasnt the result of a half-baked bill or intra-party dissent, Heghmanns suit argues: Republicans never actually planned to repeal the ACA.

As early as November, 2012, the leaders of the Republican Party knew that the Republican Party was not going to Repeal and Replace Obamacare, his suit reads. After the Re-election of President Obama in the November 2012 election, Speaker John Boehner admitted that Obamacare was not going to be repealed. Speaking to reporters he stated flatly, Obamacare is now the law of the land."

But Republicans kept fundraising on the promise of an ACA repeal. Since Boehners admission, the GOP and its branch in Virginia (Heghmanns home state) have collected over $735 Million by promising that the Republican Party would Repeal and Replace Obamacare, Heghmann writes in his suit. That promise was false and fraudulent.

The alleged fraud was baked into the GOPs now-debunked 2016 presidential election platform, which promised that a Republican president, on the first day in office, will use legitimate waiver authority under the law to halt its advance and then, with the unanimous support of Congressional Republicans, will sign its repeal." Heghmann correctly notes that this did not happen.

If Republicans do not repeal the ACA, Heghmann wants a court to force the party into returning all donations from 2013 until present.

The Republican National Committee and the Republican Party of Virginia did not return The Daily Beasts requests for comment.

Morton Blackwell, a member of the RNCs Virginia leadership team told the Virginian-Pilot that Heghmanns suit was frivolous but sign of conservative anger that the Republican-controlled Congress has not yet repealed and replaced Obamacare.

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Heghmann is far from the first Republican to attack his own party over its repeal failure. During Donald Trumps presidential campaign, Heghmann co-chaired Trumps operations in Carroll County, New Hampshire, a county that accidentally listed a journalist as a chair, forcing the journalist to contact the Trump campaign asking to be removed from its New Hampshire literature. (The journalists vacated seat was awarded to an 18-year-old.)

On the morning of the Senates most recent ACA repeal vote, Trump took to Twitter to cheer on what many viewed as an uphill effort for Senate Republicans.

Come on Republican Senators, you can do it on Healthcare. After seven years, this is your chance to shine! Don't let the American people down! Trump tweeted.

The following morning, when the sun rose on a thoroughly trounced GOP bill, Trump tweeted again to voice his disgust with 3 Republicans and 48 Democrats who let the American people down.

Heghmann claims that was the plan all along.

Continued here:
Republicans Sued for 'Racketeering' Over Trumpcare's Failure - Daily Beast

In recent weeks, we've seen Sen. John McCain defy the President by sinking the effort to repeal Obamacare. Sen. Lindsey Graham warned Trump to back off his criticism of Attorney General Jeff Sessions or it would be the beginning of the end of his presidency. Arizona Sen. Jeff Flake published a new book lambasting Republicans for remaining silent as they watch the dysfunction of this administration play out in real time. People are already speculating about potential primary challengers to Trump, should he run for reelection in 2020.

And a growing number of conservative pundits feel comfortable expressing doubts about President Trump, even in the conservative holy land of Fox News.

But this is not an easy stance for Republicans. In fact, they own President Trump. They can try to disassociate themselves from him, but they and their party are as culpable as anyone for creating a path in American politics that allowed him to win election and to govern in the way that he does. He is in fact a Republican, given what the party has become, and is not some maverick who has stolen away the party. It wasn't that he outwitted the Republican establishment, it's that the Republican establishment has changed.

To understand the roots of President Trump, it is vital to remember that the Republican Party thus far has generally stood behind him and his agenda. Evangelical voters entered into a Faustian bargain with their support for a candidate who personally seems to be the antithesis of everything that their movement supports.

Almost no Republicans have objected to the extreme measures that President Trump has been pursuing through executive action, such as rolling back regulations to curb climate change or ramping up border security.

From Newt Gingrich's election as House Speaker in the wake of the 1994 midterms through the emergence of the tea party, the Republicans have steadily shifted to the right on public policy and adopted an aggressive, do-what-it-takes style to governance that laid the groundwork for the Trump presidency.

If Republicans really become dissatisfied with President Trump and what he stands for, they will have to take a deep dive into their own history and reckon with it. Otherwise, any effort to cleanse the party of President Trump's impact won't really work. Republicans will find themselves in the same place come 2020.

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Like it or not, the Republicans own President Trump - CNN

By

August 6, 2017, 1:15 PM EDT

Senate Republicans are expressing a willingness to consider a bipartisan approach to strengthening the individual insurance market under Obamacare, even as President Donald Trump is deciding whether to end payments for it.

Photographer: Alex Wong/Getty Images

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell said on Saturday hed be open to the attempt,which follows the collapse of Republican efforts to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act, according to the Associated Press. Republican Senator Thom Tillis said hed be obligated to consider it.

We have got a destabilized market where insurance rates are going to go up 20, 30, 40 percent next year, Tillis of North Carolina said on ABCs This Week on Sunday. Anything that we can do to prevent that and the damage that that will have on people who need health care I think is something I have to look at.

The Senate health committee will begin bipartisan hearings in early September on stabilizing and strengthening the Affordable Care Acts individual insurance market, Republican Chairman Lamar Alexander of Tennessee and top Democrat Patty Murray of Washington said in a joint statement on Aug. 1.

While saying he was open to a bipartisan plan for subsidies, McConnell also said on Saturday there was still a chance to address a repeal and replacement of Obamacare -- but that it was quickly becoming unlikely, according to the AP.

Trump has also tweeted to his 35.2 million followers that senators, who are away from Washington for their summer recess, shouldnt vote on anything else until theyve completed the effort to revamp President Barack Obamas signature health law.

Health and Human Services Secretary Tom Price said July 30 that no decisions been made on whether to continue key subsidies under the law to health-insurance companies, but that the administrations job is to follow the law of the land.

The payments,called cost-sharing reductions, help insurers offset health-care costs for low-income Americans. Trump has repeatedly suggested ending the payments as bargaining tactic to bring Democrats to the negotiating table.

The next payment is due on Aug. 21.

Photographer: Drew Angerer/Getty Images

The cost-sharing reductions over time need to be eliminated, Tillis said. But we cant just all of the sudden pull the rug out from underneath an industry that has had this in place for about seven years.

Appearing together on CBSs Face the Nation on Sunday Republican Governor John Kasich of Ohio and Democratic Governor John Hickenlooper of Colorado said both parties should work to find a solution.

Republicans are going to have to admit that there is a group of people out there who will need help, Kasich said.

I think well be surprised at the number of senators that are willing to kind of step back and say, All right. Lets roll up our sleeves, and work on a bipartisan basis, and see how far we can go, Hickenlooper said.

Republican Senator Ron Johnson of Wisconsin said we do need to stabilize those markets but urged his colleagues to move on to other priorities.

I really do think we probably ought to turn our attention to debt ceiling and funding the government and tax cuts until we can really get all the parties together, Johnson said on CNNs State of the Union on Sunday.

With assistance by Mark Niquette, and Patricia Laya

View post:
Senate Republicans Nod at Bipartisan Push for Insurer Payments - Bloomberg

By Katie GlueckMcClatchy Washington Bureau

WASHINGTON (TNS) For all of Donald Trump's heated rhetoric about immigrants, he still beat Mitt Romney's 2012 showing with Latino voters last November, exit polls show.

But after the White House this week threw its support behind a proposal that would drastically reduce legal immigration, Latino Republicans are warning anew about the political perils of Trump's hardline position for him, and for the rest of the party.

"When you win the presidency, everybody thinks everything is all right, but I'm worried about Texas going the route of California," said Artemio Muniz, the Texas chairman of the Federation of Hispanic Republicans.

On Wednesday, the White House touted its support for a new immigration overhaul proposal that appears set to reduce legal immigration by half over the next 10 years through stringent restrictions on the kinds of immigrants who could enter the country. That proposal has a tough road ahead in Congress, but Republican operatives and leaders intimately familiar with the Hispanic community say that support for such an approach is another step backward when it comes to improving the GOP's generally dismal standing with Latinos at the national level.

"I don't want to say Hispanics vote exclusively on immigration, that's not true, but it does hurt him with the Hispanic community," said Alfonso Aguilar, president of the Latino Partnership for Conservative Principles, who yanked his support for Trump after a particularly hard-edged immigration speech last August but has since often emphasized areas of agreement with the administration. "It goes beyond the Hispanic community. It's what our country is all about."

Hard-line positions on immigration didn't ultimately stop Trump in November, but Latino Republicans say there's little reason for complacency: The 29 percent support he notched from the Latino community, while slightly better than Romney's results according to exit polls, still falls behind Sen. John McCain's 31 percent standing, and well behind President George W. Bush's 44 percent support from the community in 2004.

"While the math worked in 2016, it's not sustainable for Republicans to do that poorly with Latinos," said Jacob Monty, a Houston attorney who, like Aguilar, backed away from Trump late last summer, but is quick to note areas where Trump deserves credit as president now.

Juan Hernandez, who ran Hispanic outreach for McCain's presidential race and has long been involved in efforts to encourage more Hispanic Republicans to run for office, said that Trump's rhetoric makes it increasingly difficult to make the case for other Latinos to jump in as Republicans and the latest proposal further complicates that mission.

"We were doing very well getting Hispanics to run for office in the last decade, six years, but I know many would tell me, 'Look, how can I run with a big R on me, when the president is a Republican and is insulting my family, my friends from the south, and the values we've held related to NAFTA, related to hard work?'" Hernandez said, noting he has had that conversation with a number of potential candidates, though he declined to name names.

Meanwhile, several Latino Republican lawmakers who are in office were quick to push back on the plan.

"I oppose #RaiseAct bc it will destroy opportunities 4 immigrants who follow the rules + positively contribute 2 our American way of life," tweeted Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, R-Fla.

Added another Miami-area congressman, Rep. Carlos Curbelo: "If the goal is more young immigrants who speak English & can contribute to American society, start by documenting the ones already here."

And a number of Latino Republican leaders said Trump could earn significant goodwill if he offered real support of the DREAM Act, which would offer a pathway to permanent legal status for those who were brought to the United States illegally as children, a group for whom Trump has expressed some sympathy, though his White House has indicated little appetite for the DREAM Act. Either way, the focus on curbing legal immigration instead is a "misplaced priority," Monty said.

"He could bring a lot more people on board, he could show a willingness to solve urgent problems, he could get a huge win under his belt and rebuild trust with the Latino community," Monty said. "If he lets that DREAM Act issue pass, I believe it will be a lost opportunity."

Muniz fretted that there is little sense of urgency to improve GOP standing with the Latino community right now because Trump won. But he noted that drilling down into the numbers reveals that he underperformed in heavily Latino counties in Texas and elsewhere. The latest proposal is not going to help the Republican brand, he said.

"A lack of understanding is putting us in danger in Texas, Colorado, Arizona in danger politically," he said. "That's the concern I have. You've got to have a majority coalition for the future. It's very difficult to convince people when Trump takes the presidency without the Hispanic vote. It's a tough position to be in."

Added Lionel Sosa, a veteran operative with a long history of helping presidential candidates with Hispanic outreach before Trump came along: "He keeps working the base, and that's good, that's where he has the support. The question is, will the base get smaller as he goes forward or will he be able to keep it all? He has to keep 100 percent of the base to be successful. He certainly doesn't have 100 percent support of the Republican Senate, that's an indication of the way people generally feel around the country."

Certainly, not every Latino leader was ready to blast the new immigration proposal.

"While I have many disagreements with the current proposal, I am hopeful it will spur Congress to act with urgency to pass comprehensive immigration reform," read a statement from the Rev. Samuel Rodriguez, the president of the National Hispanic Christian Leadership Conference, who offered a prayer at Trump's inauguration.

And Al Cardenas, a former American Conservative Union chairman who has worked extensively on immigration reform efforts, said that some of the proposals in the plan could be acceptable if they were part of a broader comprehensive immigration reform package.

"If you package it all, you negotiate a give-and-take, that's what problem-solving is all about, I could see it, but it ought to be part of a bigger conversation," said Cardenas, who doesn't shy away from criticizing Trump when he disagrees. "Standing alone, I wouldn't urge members to vote for it."

But beyond the policy details, Hernandez said he worries about the message that the latest immigration proposal sends about the Republican Party's attitude toward immigrants in general.

"My party is in grave danger," Hernandez said. "Our brand is one that, to be honest, is an embarrassment."

See the article here:
Some Latino Republicans see peril in immigration plan - The Garden City Telegram

Republicans are smiling in the afterglow of the 2016 election but Washington chaos and congressional turmoil are leaving people on both sides of the public- opinion spectrum with a sour take on politics.

Life in the US is better now than it was 50 years ago, say 44 percent of Republicans polled by the Pew Research Center. Thats a 26-point leap from the 18 percent of GOP voters who felt that way in 2016.

As Republican views improved, Democrats views turned more negative.

Just 35 percent of Democrats say the country is better than it once was. Thats a drop of seven points from 52 percent a year ago.

Overall, only 37 percent said that American life is better now than it was in 1967, and 41 percent say things are worse.

The partisan flip-flop means that the general national mood is almost identical to what it was in August 2016, when the Pew poll found that 36 percent of Americans felt that life is better than it was.

That lines up with other pollsters findings on whether Americans think that the country is on the right or the wrong track: public opinion is still about as negative about the state of the country as it was in Barack Obamas last year as president.

And happiness about the state of their personal lives is having no impact on partisans views of how their parties are faring in Washington where both Democrats and Republicans say they feel like political losers.

Even though the GOP holds both houses of Congress and the White House, just 42 percent of Republicans say their side is winning more than it is losing a reflection of the House and Senate logjams that have stalled the Trump agenda.

More GOP voters, 46 percent, say that their side is on the losing end in Washington more often than not.

And Democrats are even more unhappy a whopping 79 percent say their party is a political loser.

Just 26 percent of those polled said their side is winning on the issues they care about most compared to 62 percent who say their representatives are losing where it counts.

The telephone poll surveyed 5,009 adults in June and July.

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Republicans, Democrats differ on perception of American life | New ... - New York Post