Pat Caddell: Trump White House ‘Looks like Fort Apache Under Attack’ by Media, Political Class
by JOHN HAYWARD
BreitBart.com
8 May 2017
Veteran political strategist Pat Caddell talked about the American Health Care Act (AHCA) and its possible effect on the 2018 midterm elections with SiriusXM host Matt Boyle on Monday’s Breitbart News Daily.
“All these smart people in Washington, who have not understood politics for some time, these are the same people who said, ‘Well, it wouldn’t hurt the Democrats. The country will love it,’” Caddell said of conventional media wisdom about Obamacare at the time of its passage.
“Then we had several elections, and now we’re saying, ‘Oh, of course, the Republicans are doomed,’” he continued, referring to predictions that as many as 20 House Republicans could be facing tougher re-election campaigns in 2018 because of the AHCA.
“No, they’re not. It depends on what they do,” Caddell argued. “So far, I’ll tell you as a fairly competent person, I have no idea what’s in this bill. That’s because, other than the talking points, the headlines thrown out by Trump administration and congressional people, I have no clue what’s in it. I don’t know how it answers the problems that have been raised.”
“But at the same time, the failure of the Republicans and the White House and the entire operation to set a narrative, made important what had to be done – to have ceded all of that ground to their opponents on the basis of, ‘Well, you know preconditions are going to be hurt, are going to be cut out of this, and we’re going to destroy Medicaid,’ whatever. To have conceded that ground is to have conceded a lot,” he continued.
“But I’m not sure the next election is going to be about health care, one way or the other,” Caddell added. “It depends on whether or not they can get something fixed, and whether or not people perceive that Donald Trump has kept his word, or whether this is just seen as another partisan battle. So I’m not so sure.”
“I don’t see any great movement in the polls, in terms of party support for either party, since they’ve been doing this for several months or raising this. I’m somewhat skeptical. I think the election in 2018 is going to be on much larger grounds than merely a healthcare revolt. It may or may not work to Donald Trump’s benefit – we will yet see – or detriment. I think that we’re going to see some other things raised. But the single most important thing is the economy and what happens to it,” he predicted.
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