Judd Gregg: What Trump should do next

He is the nominee.    

One has to give Donald Trump credit. He got there fair and square, triumphing over the strongest Republican presidential primary field since 1980, when Ronald Reagan, Bob Dole, Howard Baker and Jack Kemp were among the contenders.

But what is he going to do now?

Here is a suggestion.

He needs a “huge” plan that gets the government off America’s back. He needs to give the folks on Main Street a reason to be optimistic about their government.

This could involve the following specifics:

He should continue to say he is going to protect Social Security.    

In every election, Democrats use Social Security as a bludgeon, misrepresenting any attempt by a Republican to improve it and make it solvent.

Trump’s basic position is good but it doesn’t go far enough. He should also say that, as president, he is going to invite the Congressional leadership from both parties down to the Roosevelt Room, just off the Oval Office, and not let them leave until they work out how to make Social Security work for the next 75 years.  

Fixing Social Security is the easiest lift among all the major programs that are broken at the federal level. It is the politics that are the problem. Trump can simply say his arrival in the White House heralds a new approach: No politics, just results.

Next, he can take on tax reform. His present plan is to consolidate seven income tax brackets into four; exclude individuals making $25,000 or less (or couples making $50,000 or less) from having to pay income tax at all; and cut corporation tax to 15 percent.

But this plan is a non-starter because it would so dramatically aggravate the deficit and the debt. An analysis from the Tax Foundation last fall suggested it would add about $10 trillion to the deficit over a decade.

Still, he is thinking along the right lines. He should consider declaring a “tax year off” for the $50,000-and-below families (and for single folks at a lower income level). This plan would also involve returning to these citizens their share of the FICA tax for the year.

Trump could cut taxe rates dramatically for everyone else, but pay for it by slicing back the major deductions such as those for health insurance, state and local taxes, and charitable donations. In addition, corporate tax reform should emphasize getting back to an effective rate of 25 percent, and bringing back to America the trillions of dollars that are sitting overseas.

Third, Trump says he wants to repeal and replace ObamaCare. ‘Replace’ is the operative word. The whole healthcare system should be reoriented away from cost-plus toward an outcomes-and-value-based approach.  

Reintroducing the market into the system can do this. First, create a national catastrophic coverage plan with small premiums for low-and-middle-income people. This would mean that no one would be wiped out by a major health event.

Then, couple this with an aggressive promotion of Health Saving Accounts and other ways that can help people cover their costs for medical issues that do not rise to the catastrophic level.  

In addition, push all healthcare providers towards a capitation approach where they have a vested interest in delivering quality care in a cost-effective way.

Propose that Medicaid dollars be returned to states to manage with essentially no strings, other than the need to deliver services to the poor. Most states will do a great job if freed from the excesses of the federal bureaucracy.

Call for major reform of the disability system so we end the massive gaming and fraud that is endemic within it. A famous Trump friend, such as Carl Icahn, could take on this project. The rewards to those who truly need disability payments — and to the taxpayers, who would no longer have to meet the cost of fraudulent claims — would be “huge” indeed.

Tell veterans they can go to their hometown doctors and hospitals — or anywhere else they want — and give them insurance coverage to do so. In time, this would allow for the phasing out of the Veterans Administration. The savings would be massive and the quality of care would increase exponentially.

While Trump is presenting these specific and do-able ideas, he might also take some time to point out how tired, tried and terrible is the quasi-socialist agenda Hillary Clinton is laying out.   

Mention Greece, mention Venezuela, mention Illinois or Puerto Rico. Each of these places provides a powerful example of how ordinary people’s lives have been mangled because of the collectivist agenda of the left.

It might be fun in healthcare to remind the American people of HillaryCare. That alone is testament to how, when you let the liberal elite pursue its goal of running the lives of average Americans, you get chaos and failure.

Trump is the nominee.   

Now he has the chance to tell Americans how he will govern to get this country moving in the right direction.  

It will be interesting to see if he does.

Judd Gregg (R) is a former governor and three-term senator from New Hampshire who served as chairman and ranking member of the Senate Budget Committee, and as ranking member of the Senate Appropriations Foreign Operations subcommittee.