Not long after Georgia’s special election had been called for Karen Handel, Paul Ryan’s spokeswoman was already out boasting about what it meant for Trumpcare. “Remember when they told us we’d be punished in the special elexs for following through on our promise to #RepealAndReplace #obamacare?” she tweeted.

Such brags are entirely expected, and entirely wrongheaded.

That the Republican candidate in question barely squeaked out a win just seven months after the district’s former Republican incumbent, Tom Price, was reelected with a resounding majority doesn’t seem to register with her. Neither does the fact that Donald Trump won the district in November, however narrowly.

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That Democrats were able to muster so much political willpower in a district that’s consistently sent Republicans to Congress since 1979 (yes, you read that right) is a testament not to the palatability of the Republican’s healthcare agenda – which is opposed, remarkably, in all 50 states and the District of Columbia – but to just how displeased voters have been with Trump’s first five months.

Handel’s Democratic opponent, Jon Ossoff, lost on Tuesday. But he never should have been able to come within spitting distance of a win in such a deeply red district, and we didn’t need Tuesday night’s election to tell us that. It’s been apparent for as long as the candidates have been polling neck-and-neck in a place where a Democrat has no business doing anything but losing handily.

What matters isn’t what Georgia’s sixth means as a bellwether for 2018, as so many reductive analyses would have you believe. It isn’t representative of the country and there are dozens of House districts that would be easier for Democrats to win.

What matters is how congressional Republicans will twist the results and use them to justify support for Trump’s American Health Care Act, a version of which is rapidly and secretly advancing through the Senate and, if passed, would strip millions of Americans of insurance without ever giving them a chance to weigh in.

As Ryan’s spokeswoman reminded us last night, it’s happening already and it’s an argument made in bad faith. If Republicans believed healthcare could be a political winner or even remotely palatable to the general public, they would have been all over messaging this race.

Instead their candidate barely mentioned it, never taking a clear position on it, and Senate Republicans have gone to what can only be described as historically regressive lengths to keep the contents of the bill they’re drafting a secret. (In another special election in Montana, a Guardian colleague was literally assaulted by a Republican candidate for asking him weigh to in on the bill.)

Meanwhile Democrats have been using every rule at their disposal to draw attention to what Republicans are trying to do, holding the floor late into Monday night to help educate the public about the Republicans’ plan. “The truth,” as Bernie Sanders put it Monday night, “is that this is not a healthcare bill. This is a ‘tax break for the rich and multinational corporations’ bill.” He also asked Republican leadership why they’re so afraid of bringing the bill out.

It’s a rhetorical question, although thanks to Senate secrecy we can’t know the precise contents of the bill that leadership will hold a vote on as soon as next week. But we do know that the cuts to Medicaid in the House version of the bill, which even Trump has called “mean”, are drastic and won’t help the Republican party win any elections.



Democrats’ greatest failure on Tuesday, then, was in ever allowing such a dire, heartbreakingly reductive narrative to be constructed around a Republican stronghold in the first place. If they lost on any terms in Georgia, no matter how skewed the playing field was toward the Republican party to begin with, it would be cast as a devastating and demoralizing defeat for the Democrats and endorsement of Republican’s cruel healthcare bill.

Narratives matter, and what lawmakers tell themselves about the race matters, but let’s be clear about what the real takeaway is. The telling measure is not that Democrats didn’t win – it’s that thanks to a heartless Republican healthcare bill, the last version of which would leave an estimated 23 million people uninsured, they stood a fighting chance.

What’s more, if Republican party leadership accomplishes its aim and millions of Americans do lose their insurance so the richest of the rich can get a tax cut, these candidates won’t be eking out wins in the sunbelt exurbs of Georgia’s sixth – or anywhere else.