After presumably coming up empty on details, Trump now appears to be stalling, with the aim of railing against the A.C.A. ahead of 2020 without proposing an actual replacement. But his hesitance leaves the lane wide open for Democrats, who campaigned on the issue in 2018, and who have the advantage of the bill’s overarching popularity among voters. “Despite what [Trump] might wish you believed, we all know that Republicans are the party working to end your health care and raise costs for millions,” Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer said last week after Attorney General William Barr backed a Texas judge’s ruling that the entire A.C.A. should be struck down, a more aggressive stance than the administration embraced last year. Trump can insist all he wants that the “Republican Party will be known as the Party of Great HealtCare [sic],” but unless Republicans actually fill the vacuum—something they failed to do when they controlled Congress—his promises will remain empty.

But the administration has continued to dig in its heels, falsely claiming that plans proposed by Republicans have sought to protect coverage for those with pre-existing conditions, all while punting on specifics. This, of course, is something of a pattern for Trump, who during his campaign repeatedly claimed he had “an absolute way of defeating ISIS,” but could not reveal it because he didn’t want the enemy—or his fellow candidates—to know what it was. The notion that a former Apprentice host knew “more . . . than the generals do” was unbelievable enough. But the idea that he has the Platonic ideal of a health-care plan all teed up for a vote, if only Republicans retake the reins in 2020, requires an even larger leap of faith—particularly with the well-being of roughly 20 million people on the line.

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