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Washington • Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., has occasionally remarked on his unusual relationship with President Donald Trump: unlike most congressional leaders, he has managed to escape Trump's wrath.
"He's never, as far as I can tell, gotten angry at me — in my presence, anyway," McConnell said last month.
That fragile peace between a taciturn insider and a brash newcomer has helped both men pursue Republican priorities, but it faces an uncertain future this week as a major rewrite of the nation's health-care laws falters in the Senate. McConnell and Trump are both hungry for a win. Their understanding, built to score legislative victories, does neither of them any good if victories remain out of reach.
McConnell has largely taken responsibility for ushering the sweeping GOP rewrite of the Affordable Care Act through the Senate. Should that legislation stall this week — at least half a dozen Republican senators remain wary of the bill — the cost could be not only fury from the party's conservative base but deeper questions about the durability of the McConnell-Trump alliance.
Members of both parties are closely watching the dynamic between McConnell and Trump for a sign of what's to come.
"Trump can be impatient," former House speaker Newt Gingrich said in an interview. "He may well want to raise the heat on the institution of the Senate, if the bill does not pass by Saturday night."
But, Gingrich added, "The way our Constitution is written, he and Mitch will need each other in the end."
The Republican Congress faces a daunting set of ambitions and challenges this summer that will demand a strong relationship between the two men: overhauling the tax code, confronting a debt ceiling and passing a federal budget. The increasingly fraught push in recent days to pass the health-care bill has come with those challenges on the horizon, said multiple Republicans familiar with the discussions.
On its surface, the health-care effort is about fulfilling a GOP pledge. But Republicans said it is also a test of whether McConnell and Trump can stitch together winning coalitions on any big-ticket item this year — and reassure business leaders and activists eager for action.
Troubling Republicans amid the talks is the unpopularity of their pursuit. Obamacare has seen its support increase in polls this year, while the Republican bill has consistently proven to be unpopular. Several GOP operatives have privately said that failure would not be a total disaster for the party, since no one loves the bill, and moderates could avoid being burdened by it.
Still, Trump and McConnell have plowed forward, arguing to members that repeal is a signature party pledge and the foundation for the flurry of reforms that Republicans want to enact later this year.
But they have done so on parallel tracks, without many joint appearances or signals of a personal rapport. Their antipathy for Democrats and hunger for victory, rather than ideology or a personal connection, is what unites them, those close to them say.
The tenor of Trump's bond with McConnell contrasts with the president's relationship with House Speaker Paul D. Ryan, R-Wis., according to two White House officials who spoke on condition of anonymity. Whereas Trump and Ryan have clashed in the past yet have also shown flashes of friendliness, McConnell, 75, and Trump, 71, are transactional peers.
"Trump really believes that he can make relationships swing people his way. But he's figured out that's not the way McConnell works, so there isn't much schmoozing going on," veteran Republican strategist Vin Weber said. "It's a realistic situation. Trump isn't going to schmooze, and McConnell won't blow smoke. That's led to a relationship that has respect, though it's not warm."
Trump and McConnell are both voracious consumers of news and information, especially cable news. But their habits diverge. Trump gets his news printed out on paper, while McConnell often reads news on his iPad. Trump is a keen watcher of cable news shows in the morning and in prime time, whereas McConnell sets his evening schedule around watching Bret Baier's low-key evening report on Fox News.
In recent days, Trump's role has been encourager over phone calls and cheerleader-in-chief on Twitter, bucking up Republicans and skewering Democrats while McConnell works his members and mulls amendments.
The two have been in regular contact as McConnell has struggled to round up support for the bill's first vote, on a procedural motion. He has leaned on Trump to use his influence on the right. Several Republicans said Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, for example, is seen as someone Trump could sway. Cruz is up for reelection next year in a conservative state where crossing the president could be a problem.
"He's having some phone calls with people, but nothing too specific right now," Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, the GOP whip, said.
Trump also called Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., on Monday, according to Paul spokesman Sergio Gor. The president phoned Cruz last week. Neither senator supports the draft that McConnell released; nor does fellow conservative Sen. Mike Lee, R-Utah.
"They want to play a constructive role, and I think they are sort of looking to us to say what that is," Sen. John Thune, R-S.D., a member of the Senate GOP leadership, said of Trump and the White House. "The ball is in the Senate's court."
Trump allies remain confident that McConnell will eventually secure the necessary votes. He was central in shepherding Trump's most notable victory — the confirmation of Supreme Court Justice Neil M. Gorsuch — and that experience in particular, they said, forged their trust.
"Mitch understands Congress a lot better than Trump does," said Barry Bennett, a former Trump campaign adviser. "He's a pro. It helps that McConnell has never said a bad thing about Trump publicly."
Republicans hopes, however, were jolted again on Monday when the Congressional Budget Office concluded that the Senate bill would cause an estimated 22 million more Americans to be uninsured in the coming decade — roughly a million fewer than similar legislation passed by the House.
The developments come in the wake of a move last week that took McConnell's orbit by surprise — and raised the specter of an intraparty fight between allies of the White House and McConnell. A Trump-allied Republican super PAC announced plans for a seven-figure advertising campaign in Nevada to push Sen. Dean Heller, a moderate Republican from Nevada, to vote for the bill.
Still, McConnell's staff has built a steady rapport with Trump's legislative team, and the White House has resisted taking a heavy-handed approach on health care. Instead, Trump and his aides have mostly encouraged McConnell to take the lead in crafting the legislation — it was written mostly in secret — and in figuring out how to flip on-the-fence senators.
McConnell has not shied away from candid pronouncements about the president. Since Trump's inauguration, McConnell has urged him to focus his attention on the agenda the GOP campaigned on in 2016. He has repeatedly said he does not like the tweets Trump often uses to wage personal attacks.
Yet McConnell concluded early on he was not going to change Trump's combative ways and would have to work around them. He told The Washington Post in a February interview that he has had "candid conversations" with Trump about his tweets, but they did not make a "bit of difference."
Gingrich said McConnell's "equanimity" would end up the constant, even if this version of the health-care bill falls apart.
"McConnell is decisive and low key. Whether he gets it before July 4 or before the August break, he'll get the votes. They have to get tax reform done and this is part of that," Gingrich said. "Trump will learn that regardless of frustrations, he'll have to rely on McConnell for many, many things."