Immigration

The high priest of Beltway centrism, political scientist Norm Ornstein, writing at The Atlantic takes another look at those executive orders that President Willard “Mittens” Romney promised he would sign on “Day One in office” — that thankfully never came to pass for this pretentious Plutocrat. Mitt Romney’s Executive Actions That Never Were:

[M]y exchange with [Stuart Stevens, Mitt Romney’s campaign manager] prompted me to remember a central pledge from the Romney campaign in 2012—effectively to blow up Obamacare through executive action. Here, in the words of Lanhee Chen, Romney’s domestic-policy guru, is what Romney would have done from his first day in office, without trying to compromise with or negotiate with Congress:

A Democratic Senate would probably have blocked efforts to repeal Obamacare, leaving Romney to halt or reverse the law through executive action. As promised, he would have found a way to issue waivers from Obamacare to states so that they could pursue their own health-care reforms.

But at the end of the day, Obamacare would still be the law, partisan gridlock would still cast its shadow over the policy-making process, and President Romney’s executive actions would be the source of myriad legal challenges from the law’s supporters.

Let’s consider each of these actions separately. First, thwarted by the Democratic-controlled Senate, Romney would have issued an executive order suspending the establishment of the Obamacare exchanges, freezing funding for implementation of the law and creating broad exemptions from the individual mandate.

He also would have suspended or rewritten any regulations issued by the Obama administration that had the potential to increase health insurance costs, displace patients from their existing health insurance coverage, or restrict choices for consumers.

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