Donald Trump just undercut the House’s Obamacare replacement

Donald Trump gave conservatives in Congress even more reason to torpedo the Republicans’ Obamacare replacement bill this week. In an effort to shore up support for the fledgling American Health Care Act, Trump called conservative leaders to the White House. According to those in attendance, Trump revealed his Plan B if repeal and replace fails: “Allow Obamacare to fail and let Democrats take the blame.”

For many conservatives in Congress unenthused by the House leadership’s terribly constructed replacement bill, Plan B might be more appealing than Plan A. In fact, abandoning the rush toward repeal and replace is quickly looking like the best option for everyone involved.

The AHCA has sunk like a stone since being unveiled this week. It’s a weaker, less generous version of Obamacare that’s still too generous for the GOP’s conservatives but not generous enough for its moderates. That has quickly lodged the bill in a political no-man’s-land, with an unclear path to majority support.

Though the White House has vowed to launch a “full-court press” in support of the AHCA, it is telling that Trump is already contemplating his back-up plan on just Day 2 of that campaign. As a matter of fact, Trump has repeatedly toyed with the notion that it would be better to wait for the law to fall apart in order to turn up the heat on Democrats.

In January, Trump tweeted that Republicans must “be careful” about repealing Obamacare because that would deprive them of a political weapon against Democrats when the law “fall[s] under its own weight.” Later that month, Trump again said that he had considered “doing nothing [on healthcare] for two years, and the Dems would come begging to do something” following “catastrophic” price increases.

Of course, it’s a fantasy that the law is collapsing. But it’s a fantasy shared by Ryan and most other congressional Republicans, believing that the law is in the throes of a “death spiral.”

Still, if Trump and other conservatives believe that the law will soon crumble, then their self-perceived bargaining strength will only increase. That is, Republicans could muscle a better — and more conservative — repeal through Congress with weaker Democratic opposition once the supposed Obamacare implosion really takes hold.

Now that’s a pretty cynical strategy if you think the law is actively harming people. But conservative hardliners have no qualms about deliberately inviting crisis in order to leverage their agenda, be it shutting down the government over Obamacare repeal in 2014 or bringing the country to the cliff of a default on its debts in 2011.

So if you’re an ideologically-committed conservative hearing about Trump’s Plan B, why would you hold your nose and back the AHCA? Why settle for “Obamacare lite” today when you can wipe Obamacare off the books entirely tomorrow?

That’s the appeal of Trump’s Plan B to conservative hardliners. But what’s in it for the leadership and so-called moderates? For one thing, Ryan has become little more than a Trump lackey. If Trump calls for a strategic retreat on Obamacare, or simply tires of the oxygen the issue is consuming from his first term, you can count on Ryan to follow suit.

If so, Trump may be saving the speaker from himself. Ryan’s longstanding political goal is not repealing Obamacare, but privatizing Medicare. Were AHCA enacted, the disastrous fallout from Ryan’s plan to dole out under-funded tax credit subsidies so working-age individuals can buy insurance would destroy his ability to do the same for retirees. AHCA would thoroughly and publicly discredit Ryan’s ideas around healthcare.

Moreover, keeping Obamacare intact preserves a valuable political piñata for Republicans and avoids the party taking political ownership over the healthcare system. As Greg Sargent points out, under Trump’s Plan B, Republicans “can continue to rail at the evils of the ACA, without having to deal with the fallout of it actually being repealed.”

This spares Republicans the hard (perhaps impossible) work of crafting a healthcare system around conservative principles. Such a system that would be wildly unpopular and politically painful, especially when that work involves extinguishing Obamacare as a potent political issue for the right.

Democrats, of course, realize the flawed premises of Trump’s Plan B. The law is not failing, having insured more than 20 millionpeople and achieving its highest ever levels of popularity as Republicans prepare to take an axe to it. Obamacare will only collapse if the administration sabotages it.

But there’s no need for Democrats to disabuse Trump of his alternative fact. As George W. Bush’s failed attempt to privatize Social Security showed, the window to gut social welfare programs can close quickly on Republicans. That’s especially true for administrations prone to incompetence and scandal.

Conservatives were already hesitant to get on board with their leadership’s flawed Obamacare replacement plan. Trump just gave them all the more reason to stand pat. If AHCA is the best Republicans can do on healthcare, then a stalemate and delay might just be a bet worth taking for conservatives.