Cedar Rapids, Iowa — Democratic senator Max Baucus is retiring because he is “fed up” with the Affordable Care Act, according to his Republican colleague Chuck Grassley. Speaking at Friday night’s Lincoln Day dinner in Iowa, Grassley told the audience the Montana senator is leaving office ”because he’s so fed up with the possibility of the implementation of Obamacare being a train wreck.”


Baucus, the chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, played a key role in writing the 2010 law.

Grassley said that dissatisfaction with the health-care bill exists across party lines, describing a “bipartisan coalition in Washington” that considers the implementation of the law a disaster. “It’s a shame that a trainwreck even left the station a couple years ago,” he added, referring to Baucus’s now-infamous statement of frustration.

The 79-year-old Iowa senator also used his remarks to inveigh against the Gang of Eight’s immigration bill. A member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, Grassley has been one of the most outspoken opponents of the legislation. Referring to the 1986 immigration act signed into law by President Reagan, which legalized millions of illegal immigrants, he said, ”I want you to know that we screwed up in 1986.”

He concluded, “Today, we have 11 million people who came into our country illegally. The lesson learned: You reward illegality, you get more of it.”