Friend or foe?

President Donald Trump is trying to mend relationships with lawmakers on Capitol Hill after his efforts to improve relations with Russia backfired at home. Trump faced backlash this week from members of his own party and drew cries of treason from some Democrats for his approach to Russia at talks Monday in Helsinki with Russian President Vladimir Putin, after which Trump publicly questioned U.S. intelligence assessments of Russian interference in the 2016 U.S. presidential election.

Trump has long refrained from openly criticizing Putin, offering conciliatory words even as his administration disagreed with Moscow over the conflict in Syria, Russia’s incursion in Ukraine, human rights, and other issues.

“President Trump remains personally committed to expanding dialogue with Putin and Russia, which more or less directly contravenes his own administration’s national security strategy that recognizes Russia as a dangerous actor on the world stage and lays out a policy of containment and limited cooperation, rather than the broad-based engagement Trump favors,” said Brian O’Toole, a former Treasury Department official and a fellow at the Atlantic Council think tank.

Trump, who prides himself as a dealmaker, indicated he hoped to succeed where his predecessors have failed to relaunch relations with Russia and Putin. “Maybe he’ll be a friend,” Trump said of his Russian counterpart ahead of the summit.

U.S. Ambassador to Russia Jon Huntsman described Trump’s goal as broadly improving relations with Russia to lower the risk of conflict. Trump had spoken of Monday’s meeting in terms of relationship-building rather than pressing specific policies. “Getting along with others is a good thing, not a bad thing,” he declared.

Trump seems to believe that throwing out the traditional foreign policy playbook might deliver him a win where President Barack Obama’s “reset” crashed and President George W. Bush saw relations sour. Trump has blamed past U.S. leaders for the state of U.S.-Russian relations rather than Russia’s behavior.

But most fellow Republicans still view Russia as a malign actor. Congress last year passed sanctions opposed by the White House amid concerns that Trump would not take strong enough action against Moscow.

Republican leaders in Congress this week were again quick to distance themselves from Trump’s behavior, and the outcry forced the president to retreat. He later claimed he misspoke when he questioned intelligence assessments that Russia had sought to interfere in the 2016 U.S. presidential election.

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., noted the possibility of further sanctions legislation following last Friday’s indictment of a dozen Russians over election interference. Also, Democrats are calling for hearings with the translator from Trump’s private meeting with Putin to learn what was said.

“What happens now will depend on how serious Trump is about directing his national security staff to follow through on engagements with Russia,” said O’Toole, though he doubts much will change. Trump, O’Toole said, will continue to praise Putin and be soft on Russia, his administration will try to balance Trump’s leanings with the need to work with allies, including Congress, to push back against Russia’s malign influence, and “Putin will continue to believe he can get away with most anything he wants, since it’s clear that he does not have a foe sitting behind the Resolute desk” in the Oval Office.

Defending ICE

Instead of voting on a Democratic-sponsored bill to abolish Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), House Republicans passed Wednesday a nonbinding resolution lauding the agency and ridiculing calls for its elimination.

House Majority Whip Steve Scalise, R-La., and other Republicans at first advocated for voting on the legislation to embarrass and divide Democrats amid this year’s midterm election campaigns. Liberals see ICE as a symbol of President Donald Trump’s immigration policies, which they abhor, but other Democrats considered the bill a political blunder that could alienate moderate voters.

“The president is using ICE as a mass-deportation force to rip apart the moral fabric of our nation,” said Rep. Mark Pocan, D-Wis., the lead sponsor of the bill introduced by a handful of House Democrats last week.

Trump tweeted earlier this month that continued demands for the agency’s abolition “abandon and denounce the great men and women of ICE” and would help the GOP in the midterm elections. Republican leadership in Congress agreed with the president. “It’s the craziest position I’ve ever seen,” said House Speaker Paul Ryan, R-Wis. “They’re out of the mainstream of America, and that’s one of the reasons why I feel very good about [the midterm elections] this fall.”

The nonbinding resolution, introduced by Rep. Clay Higgins, R-La., voiced support for ICE officers “who make sacrifices every day to secure our borders, enforce our laws, and protect our safety.” It said eliminating ICE would mean “countless illegal aliens who could pose a threat to public safety would be allowed to roam free” and leave “drugs in our communities to cause more devastation.” —Kyle Ziemnick

Obamacare freeze

The Trump administration announced this month it was suspending an Obamacare program that would have redistributed $10.4 billion to insurers, citing a recent court ruling in favor of the decision. Alarmed insurers claimed the move would increase market uncertainty and drive up healthcare plan costs.

The risk-adjustment program redistributes money from insurers with healthier customers to insurers whose customers have a higher risk. The program offers an incentive for insurers to cover at-risk customers such as those struggling with chronic illness.

The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) put payments and collections on hold because of a February decision by a U.S. District Court in New Mexico. The court ruled that the Department of Health and Human Services used a flawed formula when calculating risk-adjustment payments. New Mexico Health Connections sued HHS in 2016, claiming that the Affordable Care Act’s risk-adjustment program favored larger insurers. Because the ACA’s formula is calculated using a state premium average, larger insurers’ prices have more sway. Judge James Browning issued an order that the program, although not illegal, should be reworked.

The decision runs counter to a U.S. District Court ruling in Massachusetts that upheld HHS methodology in January. CMS asked the New Mexico court to reconsider while it halted the program.

Some insurers are decrying the move. Heritage Foundation healthcare policy fellow Ed Haislmaier cautioned that the program itself created uncertainty in the market, in part because there is a two-year gap between the time payments and collections are calculated and the effects of those changes come to pass, so insurers do not know whether in the upcoming year they will pay into the program or receive money from it.

Since the program favors insurers with large chunks of the market share, insurers with a smaller percentage of the market, like New Mexico Health Connections, may benefit from the freeze. —Harvest Prude