Trump and Schumer: Potential allies now adversaries

WASHINGTON (AP) — In the weeks after November's election, President-elect Donald Trump and incoming Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumer sounded like potential allies.

Instead of praising Schumer over Twitter, Trump has taken to attacking him as Democrats' "head clown" in their party's defense of President Barack Obama's health care law.

Schumer goaded the president-elect by repurposing Trump's campaign slogan into Democrats' new rallying cry against GOP efforts to repeal the health law: "Make America Sick Again."

Trump has tapped corporate and Wall Street executives for his Cabinet, and congressional Republicans are making a partisan drive against the health law their first order of business.

Schumer and Trump have spoken by telephone four or five times since the Nov. 8 election, but not in the last few weeks, according to an official with knowledge of the conversations who spoke on condition of anonymity to disclose private interactions.

Though Trump will be an unfamiliar figure to most of establishment Washington when he takes office, he goes back decades with Schumer, whose minority caucus could exercise veto power over much of Trump's agenda thanks to Senate filibuster rules.