President Donald Trump promised voters that, as president, he’d make repealing and replacing Obamacare his top priority in office.

But perhaps no one in Washington has as much riding on the outcome of this week’s negotiations to keep the American Health Care Act as Trump’s chief of staff, Reince Priebus, whose standing with the president depends on getting a bill passed.


House GOP leaders said late Wednesday they would call a vote Thursday on the bill, signaling they believe they have the support to pass it — though the vote remains extremely close.

The bill was previously pulled without a vote in March, the first major policy setback of Trump’s presidency. Priebus, who was hired in part because of his Washington connections and perceived authority within the fractious Republican Party, bore the brunt of the blame internally.

Since then, Priebus has been engaged in a frantic push to revive the stalled bill.

He’s been pressuring GOP leadership for weeks, making dozens of calls saying “we need the vote, we need the vote,” according to a Hill source with direct knowledge of the calls. Priebus even tried to bring Congress back soon after the initial bill was pulled, according to one top White House official. The insistence puzzled some in the West Wing, given that some key members of the leadership were out of the country on foreign trips.

With Trump already past his first 100 days in office, his chief of staff’s impatience only grew. On Monday, Priebus declared on CBS, “I think it will happen this week. So much has been made of this legislation and the timing … this will be one of the fastest signature pieces of legislation since Roosevelt, I believe.” The comments, with the implied deadline for a vote, frustrated many in leadership, according to the GOP aide.

To some longtime Hill observers, the rush to schedule a vote is an effective use of White House authority. “You’re never going to have the votes until you call the vote,” said Trent Lott, a former Senate Majority Leader who is now a lobbyist. “Until you make them take the vote, they’re going to hide, they’re going to obfuscate, they’re going to lie.”

Should the bill pass, Priebus allies are already prepared to sell it as his first big win in the job. “Reince has been running this,” said one top White House ally. “He’s been turning this around.”

A White House spokesperson echoed that view. “Of course Reince is pushing to get health care done,” said the spokesperson. “What are we supposed to sit around and wait for the vote to happen? It appears that we’re a lot closer than we have been and that’s because he’s taken a leadership role here.”

Other White House officials are quick to note that Priebus is only one part of the wheel, with others sharing responsibility for the bill’s success or failure.

Yet Priebus has seemed to be the most invested in the outcome. A senior GOP aide described Priebus as “overeager” and acting in a way that suggested that his job is on the line.

Priebus has sometimes struggled in his new West Wing role, acknowledging to associates that the White House needs to improve its internal organization, that Trump is difficult to manage and that the president sets unrealistic expectations.

Known for being well-organized and a taskmaster at the Republican National Committee, he’s been perplexed by his famously mercurial boss, who can make decisions based on a conversation with a business associate in a hallway, several administration officials say. He has sometimes proved paranoid, when other West Wing staffers know things that he does not. He has tried to control some of the president’s media consumption, with little luck.

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Priebus has come under severe pressure from Trump to get the health care bill through. At one point in April, Priebus delivered a veiled threat to Ryan — telling him his job could be in jeopardy if the votes weren’t there. “There will be calls for you to resign,” said one person familiar with the conversation.

“He’s working this nonstop,” said one of Priebus’ allies in the White House. If the health bill passes, “You’re going to see a Reince victory tour,” one senior administration official said. “Wait and see.”

But if the bill goes down, another West Wing official predicted Priebus would back away. “It would be a very public failure on a very big stage twice,” said this official. “You said you had the votes once and then you lost, and then you’re involved in the effort to redeem yourself the second time, that would be a heavy blow.”

