We know, from listening in on Donald Trump’s cabinet meetings, that he makes the best deals.
We know from MAGA-adjacent social media that Trump’s overwhelming personality and charisma cause even the hardest of hard cases to melt in his presence — and therefore give Trump whatever he wants/demands.
We know from reading a ghost-written book and watching a reality TV show and listening to Trump in any self-aggrandizing interview that he is not only the master of the art of the deal, but of just about everything.
And yet, let’s just look at the last week or so of Trump negotiations.
In Trump’s two-hour phone call with his buddy Vladimir Putin, they were, uh, negotiating an end to Russia’s war with Ukraine, or at least jumpstarting a ceasefire. But it was Trump who melted. Who turned out, once again, to be Putin’s bobo. Who threw Ukraine under the bus again, abandoning any pretense of moving toward a ceasefire, while threatening to walk away from peace negotiations altogether.
Putin is not actually interested in peace. Volodymyr Zelenskyy is not interested in giving up his country to Russia. And so, what else could Trump do? I mean, he wasn’t going to admit that he was in over his head, was he?
We remember, of course, that Trump promised he would end the war in Ukraine on Day One of his administration. How many days is it now? How many weeks? How many months?
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We can’t forget Trump’s trip to the Middle East, in which he threw human rights under the bus, as he sat in awe of the golden palaces of the petro-princes and embraced a $400 million gift/bribe from Qatar. In all, he enriched himself with a level of corruption rarely seen by an American president, at least since the Teapot Dome scandal or maybe when Nixon said he wasn’t a crook.
Trump did make big deals, for himself anyway — in dealing with supporters of Hamas and enemies of his once-friend Israel. Funny, but Trump didn’t say much about that other war — the one in Gaza — he assured us would be a cinch to end.
There were a few Trump supporters who claimed to have been shocked by his nakedly corrupt and artless deal-making in the Middle East. But only those who have willfully failed to pay attention.
And then there was Trump’s visit to the Capitol on Tuesday, attempting to salvage his big, beautiful budget bill, which is not simply how Trump describes it but how it is actually officially named — “One Big Beautiful Bill.”
During his trip to speak to House Republicans, he did what he does.
He threatened. He bullied. He demanded fealty. He tried everything he could, straight from the Roy Cohn handbook.
And then, upon leaving the Capitol, apparently without yet persuading enough Republicans to pass the bill, he praised the GOP’s unity, as if he had, of course, won the day.
My guess is that he will eventually win. Because Republicans basically have no choice. How could they explain their inability to pass a critical bill when they control the presidency and also both houses of Congress?
That would be, as the kids used to say, an epic fail. And yet, the bill is in trouble on several fronts.
Some of the GOP so-called moderates, particularly from high-tax New York, want the current deduction for state and local taxes (SALT), now capped at $10,000, to be raised or eliminated.
Trump advised those grandstanders, in a nifty piece of negotiating, to “quit talking about SALT. Don’t ask for any more.”
At least three Republican New Yorkers — Mike Lawler, Nick LaLota and Andrew Garbarino — told reporters after the meeting that they were still “no votes” on the bill and that, yes, they would still talk and would still ask for more.
Trump had similar advice for those who oppose the Medicaid portion of the bill. Not because, as written, it would kick something like 8 million people off Medicaid, according to the Congressional Budget Office. A surprising number of those 8 million people are members of Trump’s working-class coalition, which he says he means to protect.
But opposing Congress members — many of them members of the far-right Freedom Caucus — want deeper cuts in Medicaid and whatever else they can find in the safety net, like, you know, food assistance for poor kids.
And what did Trump say to them? “Don’t f—k around with Medicaid.”
Trump, of course, has promised repeatedly to not cut Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid — although he actually would cut Medicaid bigly if the big, beautiful bill passed, by some $700 billion over 10 years.
According to Rep. Thomas Massie, R-Kentucky, “(Trump) said, ‘Don’t cut Medicaid — just shut up about it.’ He said, ‘You can go after waste, fraud and abuse — that’s it; stop there.’ He was talking to the Freedom Caucus about that.”
As for Massie, a self-described libertarian who wants deeper cuts, Trump said, “I don’t think Thomas Massie understands government. I think he’s a grandstander frankly. We don’t even talk to him much. I think he should be voted out of office.”
Previously, Trump had said he would “lead the charge” in a primary challenge of Massie, who still says he’s a “no” vote.
If Trump tuned in to Massie’s interview with CNN’s Manu Raju Tuesday about how the big, beautiful bill would add trillions to the national debt, he’d be angrier still.
Republicans insist the bill is revenue neutral, which Massie called a “joke.” He told Raju, “Under the policies of this bill, we’re going to add $20 trillion to the debt over the next 10 years, which is $3½ — to $5 trillion more than would be added otherwise.”
And who would benefit? I don’t need to tell you that the richest among us will benefit the most. The poorest among us may not benefit at all.
As for its take on Medicaid, the bill is already wrong — and probably politically untenable come 2026 — in so many ways.
Trump wants to cut federal Medicaid payments to any state that benefits undocumented immigrants. Bashing immigrants is always a good way to unify post-McCain Republicans. Trump wants to cut federal Medicaid payments to states that pay, with their own tax dollars, for more generous Medicaid benefits than the federal government does. And so it goes.
And they want to put a work requirement into place, demanding at least 80 documented hours of work a month for childless adults. You can read all about it in a New York Times op-ed co-written by, among others, RFK Jr. and Dr. Oz. Yes, you can. And please note that they call Medicaid “welfare.”
Polls show that going after able-bodied Medicaid recipients is popular. But it might be less popular if people understood what it means or that the great majority of working-age Medicaid enrollees actually do work. Or go to school. Or care for a loved one. Or are disabled.
The documentation is what matters here. As you may not know, many people can only get sporadic shift work. They have no choice in how many — or, more to the point, how few— hours they get in a day, if they get any at all. Of course, there are the unemployed — over 20 million workers were laid off or fired last year, in numbers that Elon Musk could only dream of. Many of those workers get their health insurance through Medicaid.
According to government statistics, 46% of Medicaid recipients are either children or age 65 or older. Of the working age participants, half are working, 25% are in some way disabled, another 15% will come soon off Medicaid rolls, meaning only 6% of working-age enrollees are not working. Meanwhile, studies show that putting in requirements does nothing at all, except for adding reams of paperwork that, if not filled out and filed, would mean ineligibility, which means less money spent, which means more money to give to billionaires.
Is cruelty the point?
In MAGA world, it’s cruel that Republicans can afford to lose only three votes in order to pass this big, beautiful bill, because of their tiny, ugly House majority.
Trump didn’t mention any cruelty in this trip to the Capitol, particularly not in relation to those who would lose Medicaid, because Trump attributes the cuts solely to the rooting out of waste, abuse and fraud. You may remember those same words as the excuse for the DOGE boys cutting USAID and putting many thousands of children at risk of dying from starvation and related diseases.
Trump did mention, though, the possible fate of any Republican who dared vote against his big, beautiful bill. When asked if he would lead a primary challenge against dissenters Trump said, “Possibly.”
The Negotiator in Chief was making his point, one you couldn’t miss, to any potential holdout: Don’t f—k with “possibly.”
Mike Littwin has been a columnist for too many years to count. He has covered Dr. J, four presidential inaugurations, six national conventions and countless brain-numbing speeches in the New Hampshire and Iowa snow. Sign up for Mike’s newsletter.
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