--- title: Donald Trump: Healthcare Bill Failure is Democrats' Fault description: President Trump blamed Democrats on Friday for the failure of the GOP healthcare bill that would have replaced the Affordable Care Act canonical: https://time.com/4713021/donald-trump-republican-ahca-failure-democrats/ author: Katie Reilly article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2017-03-24T21:38:07.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-02-23T04:02:13.152Z article:section: Politics og:title: President Trump: It's the Democrats' Fault the Health Care Bill Failed og:description: He predicted Democrats would work with Republicans after "Obamacare explodes" og:url: https://time.com/4713021/donald-trump-republican-ahca-failure-democrats/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltf1444bcec34b9790/6988bfe486f68e2ac86e3fcc/donald-trump-gop-healthcare-bill.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 4000 og:image:height: 2250 og:image:alt: President Trump Speaks After House GOP Pulls Vote On American Health Care Act og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: President Trump: It's the Democrats' Fault the Health Care Bill Failed twitter:description: He predicted Democrats would work with Republicans after "Obamacare explodes" twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltf1444bcec34b9790/6988bfe486f68e2ac86e3fcc/donald-trump-gop-healthcare-bill.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # President Trump: It's the Democrats' Fault the Health Care Bill Failed > Sponsored content. 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Brief is TIME's Washington newsletter, written by senior correspondent Philip Elliott. It explains the politics, personalities and power dynamics behind the headlines, three times a week. It reaches 85,000 subscribers with a 37.0% open rate as of August 2026. #### Where can I get analysis of Washington politics by email? D.C. Brief is TIME's free Washington politics newsletter, available at time.com/newsletters. It is written by a TIME senior correspondent who covers the capital full time. #### Who writes TIME's D.C. Brief? Philip Elliott, a senior correspondent at TIME, writes D.C. Brief. #### Is D.C. Brief free? Yes. D.C. Brief is free at time.com/newsletters.  by [Katie Reilly](https://time.com/author/katie-reilly/)  ## Katie Reilly Mar 24, 2017 9:38 PM UTC  President Donald Trump reacts with Vice President Mike Pence (R) after Republicans abruptly pulled their health care bill from the House floor, in the Oval Office of the White House on March 24, 2017. President Donald Trump reacts with Vice President Mike Pence (R) after Republicans abruptly pulled their health care bill from the House floor, in the Oval Office of the White House on March 24, 2017. Olivier Douliery—Pool/Getty Images  by [Katie Reilly](https://time.com/author/katie-reilly/)  ## Katie Reilly Mar 24, 2017 9:38 PM UTC President Donald Trump blamed Democrats on Friday for the [failure of the GOP health care bill](http://time.com/4712883/ahca-paul-ryan-donald-trump-no-vote-obamacare/?xid=homepage) that would have [replaced the Affordable Care Act](http://time.com/4697086/threat-of-obamacare-repeal-motivates-patients-to-become-activists/). House Republicans withdrew the bill on Friday after it became clear they [lacked the votes](http://time.com/4712627/ahca-republicans-fall-short-votes/) for it to pass, a development that served a major setback to their consistent promise to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act. The GOP has majorities in both the House and Senate. “Perhaps the best thing that could happen is exactly what happened today because we’ll end up with a truly great health care bill in the future after this mess known as Obamacare explodes,” Trump said Friday afternoon, speaking from the Oval Office. He predicted that Democrats would look to work with Republicans on health care reform in the future, even as Democratic lawmakers celebrated the failure of the Republican plan. “Whenever they’re ready, we’re ready,” Trump said, repeatedly arguing that “with no Democrat support, we couldn’t quite get there.” The bill also faced opposition from many Republicans and health organizations. In an earlier press conference on Friday, Republican House Speaker Paul Ryan explained that the GOP-controlled House was unable to reach consensus on the controversial bill. “This is a setback — no two ways about it — but it is not the end of this story,” Ryan said. Trump said he still had confidence in Ryan and refrained from casting blame on Republicans who had withheld their support. “A lot of people don’t realize don’t how good our bill was,” Trump said, arguing that when taken as a three-phase plan, “it became a great bill.” ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/4713021/donald-trump-republican-ahca-failure-democrats/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/4713021/donald-trump-republican-ahca-failure-democrats/"},"headline":"President Trump: It's the Democrats' Fault the Health Care Bill Failed","datePublished":"2017-03-24T21:38:07.000Z","dateModified":"2026-02-23T04:02:13.152Z","description":"He predicted Democrats would work with Republicans after \"Obamacare explodes\"","url":"https://time.com/4713021/donald-trump-republican-ahca-failure-democrats/","keywords":["White House","Health Care","republicans","Congress","Healthcare","Donald Trump","onetime"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltf1444bcec34b9790/6988bfe486f68e2ac86e3fcc/donald-trump-gop-healthcare-bill.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Katie Reilly","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/katie-reilly/"}],"articleSection":"Politics","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltf1444bcec34b9790/6988bfe486f68e2ac86e3fcc/donald-trump-gop-healthcare-bill.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"President Trump Speaks After House GOP Pulls Vote On American Health Care Act","caption":"President Trump Speaks After House GOP Pulls Vote On American Health Care Act","creditText":"Olivier Douliery—Pool/Getty Images","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/section/politics/","name":"Politics"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"/tag/white-house/","name":"White House"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/4713021/donald-trump-republican-ahca-failure-democrats/","name":"President Trump: It's the Democrats' Fault the Health Care Bill Failed"}}]}] ```