“If we don’t, we’re dead,” Graham said about the plans to pass tax reform.
President Trump will be out of a job — and the Republican Party as a whole would be “dead” — if the GOP doesn’t pass health care and tax reform, Sen. Lindsey Graham predicted Sunday.
The South Carolina Republican said the GOP has already had too many high-profile failures this year, and its next grand ambition — passing the biggest tax plan overhaul in three decades — could be the last straw.
“Our problem is that we promised to repeal and replace Obamacare, and we failed,” Graham told CBS News’ “Face the Nation.”
“We promised to cut taxes and we have yet to do it. If we’re successful, (Senate Majority Leader) Mitch McConnell’s fine. If we’re not, we’re all in trouble. We lose our majority and I think President Trump will not get reelected.”
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Graham, who ran against Trump in the 2016 campaign and has often clashed with him in public this year, acknowledged that Trump has left the GOP-dominated Congress overwhelmed with demands to pass solutions for health care, taxes, the Iran nuclear deal and the fate of Dreamer immigrants after the DACA program disappears.
Trump hoped to make a repeal and replacement of Obamacare his first major legislative accomplishment, promising to do it “quickly” if elected. But after multiple GOP health care bills failed over the summer, the year is destined to end without a replacement passed.
Trump is now pushing for the GOP to pass a massive tax overhaul, but that plan has already run into trouble. Democrats and, according to surveys, the majority of Americans believe Trump’s plan would overwhelmingly benefit the rich while failing to deliver the middle-class tax cuts Trump assured. Trump administration officials have struggled to push dubious promises that the middle class will reap the benefits of their plan.
Graham, who golfed with Trump on Saturday, said the party’s majority and its future will face make-or-break moments while trying to pass tax reform.
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“If we don’t, we’re dead,” he said.
