ConservativeHQ.com Staff
April 1, 2017
Make no mistake about what went on Thursday with the shocking tweet in which President Trump appeared to attack members of the Freedom Caucus, some of his earliest and staunchest supporters in Congress.
It is not about a policy difference over getting rid of Obamacare – it is about White House Chief of Staff Reince Priebus and his home state buddy House Speaker Paul Ryan saving their jobs.
Priebus is clearly out of his depth as White House Chief of Staff. His only real qualification for the job is his relationship with Speaker Ryan and after the Ryancare debacle in which the President was drawn into supporting a bill something like 100 members of the House Republican Conference were prepared to vote against Priebus’ job was on the line.
And it still is.
Same with Ryan.
When the Ryancare – or RINOcare bill as we prefer to call it – blew up Washington was abuzz with the rumor that Ryan was on his way out as Speaker.
Republican officials in Congress and the White House were openly discussing finding a GOP replacement to Paul Ryan as Speaker of the House, after Ryan failed to pass the American Health Care Act out of the House and misled the public and President Donald Trump when he promised repeatedly the bill would pass.
Our friend Matthew Boyle of Breitbart reported many allies of the president and several White House officials over the weeks since have confirmed to Breitbart News that the president is concerned that Ryan may not have his—or his agenda’s—best interests at heart. Ryan’s failure to deliver the votes on healthcare cement Trump’s skepticism of Ryan, they say.
“This is another example of the staff not serving the president well and the weakness of the Paul Ryan speakership,” a source close to President Trump told Breitbart News. “This calls into question once again the speaker’s commitment to supporting Donald Trump and his agenda.”
“Speaker Ryan proved today that he does not have the best interests of the President at heart,” a source close to the president told Boyle. “He sold out the president and showed his word can be taken with a grain of salt. There is only one course of action that should be taken to move past this catastrophe and that is the swift removal of Paul Ryan from the speakership.”
White House sources tell Breitbart News that the president is very frustrated with Ryan and feels that he has saved him multiple times already. After the election in November, it was widely reported that there were enough Republican votes to remove Ryan as Speaker—and the only reason conservatives kept him is that Trump won the election and embraced Ryan. But now Trump may perceive Ryan as a burden rather than someone who can help enact his agenda reported Boyle.
What’s changed in the last week?
Absolutely nothing, except that Ryan and Priebus are now desperate to save their jobs and to do that they need a scapegoat for their failure.
Thus, the attack on the Freedom Caucus.
Freedom Caucus Chairman Rep. Mark Meadows (NC-11) told The Washington Examiner “The narrative is not surprising in the White House because I think some of his [President Trump’s] advisers are suggesting that it was consensus that we pulled the rug out from underneath the president’s agenda and nothing could be further from the truth… But that being said, I don’t take it personally.”
Former Freedom Caucus Chairman Rep. Jim Jordan also downplayed the fight by saying there’s still time to make changes to the bill that he said would help “fix” the legislation so it does what Republicans promised to do: change the bill in a way that lowers premiums for people.
“All we’re trying to do is fix the legislation,” Jordan said. “The whole world thinks, ‘oh, because a bill got postponed, this town is going crazy, the sky is going to fall.’ It’s not. Let’s just fix it and quit worrying about tweets and statements and blame and let’s focus on the actual document.”
Representatives Meadows and Jordan, two limited government constitutional conservative heroes, are right. This battle that has been ginned-up between the President and conservatives isn’t about accomplishing the President’s policy – it is about Speaker Ryan and White House Chief of Staff Paul Ryan saving their jobs. It’s time for the President to change the password on his Twitter account and focus his efforts on fulfilling his promise to pass a bill that will actually do what Ryancare never will – lower premiums for the forgotten Americans the Freedom Caucus represents.
Reprinted with permission from ConservativeHQ.com
