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When United States House Speaker Paul Ryan conceded that Republicans would have to pull legislation to repeal former US president Barack Obama’s controversial health law last Friday, he candidly acknowledged that the deep divisions within the Republican Party that had been brewing during its years in opposition had come to the fore.
“We were a 10-year opposition party, where being against things was easy to do,” said Mr Ryan. “Now, in three months’ time, we tried to go to a governing party where we actually had to get 216 people to agree with each other on how we do things.”
Mr Ryan’s remarks, and the failed push to repeal Obamacare, show that while the Republican Party has achieved the rare feat of controlling virtually all major levers of power in Washington, old divisions are still hampering its ability to register early legislative victories.
DEEP IDEOLOGICAL DIFFERENCES
The Republican Party has traditionally been made up mainly of a mix of fiscal conservatives, social conservatives and national security conservatives. But over the past decade, as Republicans faced successive election defeats, the fissures have deepened between the more centrist establishment and a largely populist ring-wing fringe.
Much has been said about where the fault lines really lie — whether in terms of race, education level and even media sources consumed. But deep divisions have also emerged on issues that are central to the Republican Party’s future, not just on healthcare but also immigration and free trade.
Things began to boil over with the rise of the Tea Party movement, which emerged in 2010. The movement began propelling much more conservative legislators into office in successive elections, many of whom came to make up the so-called Freedom Caucus in the House of Representatives. This is the key bloc that refused to vote in favour of Mr Trump’s healthcare Bill last Friday.
Although the Freedom Caucus is a rather loose coalition of about 30 legislators, it has proven itself a major faction for Republican regulars to contend with over the years when it acts collectively.
During the Obama administration, it was not afraid to use hardline tactics such as the government shutdown to get the outcomes it wanted. It was also one of the driving forces behind the resignation of former House Speaker John Boehner.
The divisions between the establishment and populist wings of the Republican Party only further deepened during the 2016 elections, as Mr Trump marched to his eventual victory.
During the primaries, Mr Trump’s protectionist and anti-immigrant campaign alienated many groups of mainstream Republicans but appealed to the base more than to establishment candidates such as Jeb Bush or Marco Rubio.
And, during the general election, Mr Trump was also not afraid to pour salt on the wounds of the divided Republican Party by harnessing the power of the far-right.
When Mr Trump appointed Steve Bannon as the CEO of his campaign, he essentially endorsed the “alt-right” movement, a brand of far-right conservatism whose leading outlet is Breitbart News, a publication of which Bannon has been a founding member
The alt-right movement has been associated with white nationalism.
Mr Trump’s decision to let Mr Bannon assume the role of chief strategist in his administration raised the possibility that Mr Bannon may use his position to boost the influence of a Bannonite ethnic nationalist faction within the party alongside moderate figures such as Mr Ryan and more right-wing ones such as Freedom Caucus chairman Mark Meadows.
Immediately following the election, some had hoped that some of these divisions within the Republican Party would be reconciled or at least papered over.
The hope was that even if many Republicans neither agreed with Mr Trump on major issues nor trusted him, they would be willing to live with that as long as he signed legislation.
That was always a bit of a stretch. As prominent conservative pundit David Brooks pointed out in late January, any sort of “Faustian bargain” vastly understated the deep ideological differences between the factions that would eventually reveal themselves as the Trump administration began governing.
And so it has proved thus far. Divisions within the party had already begun to slowly emerge as soon as the administration got to work, with some Republicans expressing concern and opposition to several missteps — from the initial rollout of the travel ban to the response to allegations of connections between the campaign and Russia.
But the failed healthcare repeal bid is the first major issue where these divisions have been really exposed.
In the days up to and following the vote, there were reports of substantive disagreements between Mr Ryan and the Freedom Caucus, and even claims that Mr Trump had threatened to back primary challengers to run against Republicans opposing the Bill.
Irrespective of what occurred up to the vote, the outcome clearly illustrated that needling the thread between different factions of the party could prove tougher than Mr Trump, Mr Ryan and Mr Bannon all expected.
Members of the Freedom Caucus complained that the Bill looked too similar to Obamacare, while more moderate Republicans worried that it looked too different, with their constituents either losing coverage or seeing rising premiums.
HOW WILL TRUMP RESPOND?
What happens next is far from clear. These deep divisions could heal if there is some reconciliation and compromise between the Republican factions.
After all, though the failure to secure votes was framed as an ideological battle, Mr Trump’s Bill itself was also hurriedly and poorly conceived, and some concerns could indeed be eased if more work were put into it.
There certainly is an incentive for Republicans and the Trump administration to at least try to change Obamacare somewhat, given that they have placed this issue on the frontburner for the past four straight election cycles.
But considering the blows that Mr Trump has taken recently and his low approval rating as we move closer to the 2018 mid-term elections, the Freedom Caucus and other likeminded legislators may feel as though they hold all the cards.
On the other hand, the divisions could also get much worse if Mr Trump chooses to punish dissenters within the Republican Party — including the Freedom Caucus — and chooses instead to cross the aisle and turn to Democrats to support other items in his legislative agenda.
On Thursday morning, Mr Trump took to Twitter to suggest that this might be the path he pursues.
“The Freedom Caucus will hurt the entire Republican agenda if they don’t get on the team, & fast,” tweeted Mr Trump. “We must fight them, & Dems, in 2018!”
By the evening, he was targeting specific Freedom Caucus members, suggesting that if they “would get on board”, healthcare and tax reform could be accomplished.
This could end up being nothing more than posturing. But if that is indeed the course Mr Trump chooses to adopt, it will not be as easy as he seems to be indicating.
If the Freedom Caucus stays united and is forced into a battle with Mr Trump, the 30-vote bloc out of the 237-member caucus could dig its heels in and frustrate major legislation if lawmakers are confident they can fend off any potential challengers to their seats in 2018.
Wooing Democrats on other legislative items is also no walk in the park. Buoyed by an energetic Democratic base and an enervated Republican Party, they may attach some tough terms to any deal that Mr Trump attempts to strike with them.
Some of these issues, be it infrastructure development or tax reform, have not made headway for years and are not that much easier than healthcare, as some are portraying them to be.
Though the failed healthcare repeal was a humiliating defeat for the Trump administration and a fractious Republican Party, it is still early days.
Alignments may shift, and bridges can be built.
At least thus far, though, the deep divisions within the Party look like they will take a much longer time to heal.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR:
Prashanth Parameswaran is Associate Editor at The Diplomat Magazine based in Washington, DC, where he writes extensively about US foreign policy in the Asia-Pacific, Asian security affairs, and South-east Asia.