The Story:
Senator McCain leaves a complicated, imperfect, but memorable legacy as a ‘maverick’ legislator on the Republican side. One of the subtexts of the talk of his life and passing as he is mourned involves the question of who else might fill an analogous role in his party’s development, who else might be an in-house critic willing to display a “thumbs down” even at the expense of a key program of a sitting and popular Republican President.
One Year Ago:
On July 25, 2017 — only a week after the brain surgery that discovered the fatal tumor — McCain returned to the Senate for final debate and votes on proposals to repeal Obama era legislation on health care insurance.
The administration and the Republican leadership in the Senate did not have the votes to pass any of these proposals, and most of the complicated ‘Obamacare’ package remains the law of the land today. On the third effort at repeal, the so-called ‘skinny repeal’ bill, McCain’s vote proved the decisive one, and in the well of the Senate he signaled to the gallery what that vote was: with a dramatic thumbs down gesture. Skinny repeal failed 51 to 49.
The Thing to Know:
There are a handful of Republicans in the US Senate who have both the stature and the inclination to challenge the President within the party caucus. Susan Collins of Maine is one of them, Lisa Murkowski of Alaska is another and (if he wins election in November) Mitt Romney of Utah may be yet a third. What role any of these individuals may play in the way events unfold for the remainder of this Presidency is now in the lap of the gods.
