Source: Politics<\/p>\n
Donald Trump couldn\u2019t repeal Obamacare in 2017, largely because it had become too popular. It\u2019s even more popular now.<\/p>\n
Roughly three-in-five Americans like the 2010 health care law, even more than when Trump and Republicans in Congress came to the brink of wiping it out. And some of the Affordable Care Act\u2019s better-known provisions \u2014 like protections for preexisting health conditions \u2014 engender even greater support.<\/p>\n
When Trump said last week he\u2019d try again to repeal the law if he wins next year\u2019s presidential election, he did more than pick at an electoral scab that party strategists hoped had healed by now. He threatened to bring back to life a potent electoral issue that contributed significantly to the GOP\u2019s wipeout in the 2018 midterms and on which public opinion has only moved away from Republicans since.<\/p>\n
Republican voters are far less interested than Democrats in hearing the candidates talk about the health care law, according to new polling data<\/a> released Friday by KFF, formerly known as the Kaiser Family Foundation. Only 32 percent of self-identified Republican voters think it\u2019s very important for candidates to talk about the future of the Affordable Care Act, the poll shows, compared to 70 percent of Democrats.<\/p>\n So not only is Trump crosswise with the overall electorate over his renewed repeal push \u2014 he\u2019s also injected an issue into the campaign for which there\u2019s no groundswell of support among Republicans.<\/p>\n The former president has succeeded over the course of his political career by tapping into sentiments of Republicans that other candidates have ignored or missed, but that does not appear to be the case here.<\/p>\n \u201cRepublican voters weren\u2019t itching for him to come out and make a statement on the ACA,\u201d said Ashley Kirzinger, the director of survey methodology at KFF, which maintains the most comprehensive trendlines in polling on health care policy.<\/p>\n Those trendlines suggest relitigating Obamacare would be a minefield for Republicans.<\/p>\n The story of the Affordable Care Act\u2019s once-unlikely survival is well known: Unpopular for much of Barack Obama\u2019s presidency, the law gained public support as Republicans who controlled Congress moved closer to repealing it. By the time of then-Sen. John McCain\u2019s famous \u201cthumbs-down\u201d vote against repeal in July 2017, KFF\u2019s tracking poll showed Obamacare had just reached majority support for the first time.<\/p>\n By November 2018, when Democrats successfully leveraged the health care issue to win the House majority and narrow Republicans\u2019 advantage in the Senate, 53 percent of Americans viewed the law favorably.<\/p>\n And the spike in Obamacare\u2019s popularity hasn\u2019t receded since those midterms, which eliminated any real legislative threat to the law. It\u2019s steadily increased.<\/p>\n The latest KFF tracking poll<\/a>, conducted in May, found 59 percent of Americans had a favorable opinion of the Affordable Care Act, while 40 percent viewed it unfavorably. The 19-point net favorability advantage is the second-largest KFF has ever recorded \u2014 bested only by another poll earlier this year.<\/p>\n This doesn\u2019t mean the Affordable Care Act is popular with Republicans. In the poll this May, only about a quarter of self-identified Republicans, 26 percent, had a favorable opinion of Obamacare. Still, that\u2019s greater than the 16 percent of Republicans who viewed it favorably during the peak of the 2017 repeal fight<\/p>\n But opposition to Obamacare is a loser with independents: 62 percent viewed the law favorably.<\/p>\n While it\u2019s not always easy to untangle the electoral impact of one issue from another, exit polls and other voter surveys provide clues. In 2018, the network exit poll<\/a>, conducted by Edison Research, found that 41 percent of voters nationally said health care was their most important issue, and they voted for the Democratic congressional candidate in their districts by a three-to-one margin, 75 percent to 23 percent.<\/p>\n By the time of the 2020 election, when repeal was in the distant political past, only 11 percent of voters said health care was most important to their vote for president, according to the exit poll<\/a>. (Those voters backed Joe Biden over Trump by 25 points.) And AP VoteCast<\/a>, another voter survey, found that only 24 percent of 2020 voters wanted to repeal all of Obamacare, though another 25 percent said they would favor repealing parts of it.<\/p>\n Repealing Obamacare was the hallmark of Trump\u2019s first months in office, but now it\u2019s barely on Republicans\u2019 minds.<\/p>\n The 32 percent of Republican voters who say it\u2019s \u201cvery important\u201d for the 2024 candidates to discuss the future of the law is significantly fewer than the 49 percent of registered voters overall who agree.<\/p>\n By a 20-point margin, 59 percent to 39 percent, all voters say they trust the Democratic Party to do a better job handling the Affordable Care Act than the GOP.<\/p>\n The latest KFF poll was conducted Oct. 31-Nov. 7 \u2014 prior to Trump\u2019s musings about repealing Obamacare. Kirzinger, the KFF pollster, said it\u2019s possible Trump can bring Republicans along on another repeal push, though there was little appetite for it in the survey.<\/p>\n More voters say it\u2019s \u201cvery important\u201d for the candidates to talk about inflation, though \u201cthe affordability of health care\u201d \u2014 an issue that combines inflation and health care, to some degree \u2014 was second.<\/p>\n That, Kirzinger said, could present an opportunity for Republican candidates to tailor their health care messaging.<\/p>\n \u201cIf there is a framing of the ACA that is around health care costs, that could be a really popular talking point,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n But for now, Obamacare remains more popular than the 2017 repeal fight. And given Democrats\u2019 advantage on health care \u2014 both historic and present-day, according to the polling \u2014 any foray into the issue from Trump would be venturing into hostile territory.<\/p>\nObamacare has continued to get more popular since 2017.<\/h5>\n
Republicans aren\u2019t motivated by Obamacare anymore.<\/h5>\n