Al Franken and David Axelrod have dueling accounts of 2010 Obamacare fight

July 28--Republicans may be turning their guns on each other following Friday's failed attempt to pass the "skinny repeal" of Obamacare in the U.S. Senate.

But it also was bumpy behind the scenes for the Democrats before they passed the Affordable Care Act in 2010, according to dueling accounts of a battle between U.S. Sen. Al Franken and Chicago's own David Axelrod.

Axelrod landed the first blow in his 2015 memoir "Believer," in which he described confronting the former "Saturday Night Live" star "through slightly gritted teeth" at a closed-door meeting about health care in February 2010.

Obama's chief political adviser described a rant Franken directed at him about delays in passing Obamacare as being delivered "with a forced flourish that revealed why he had been a comedian and not a dramatic actor."

If the insult smarted, Franken struck back in his recently released tome, "Al Franken: Giant of the Senate." In Franken's telling, he "dropped the F-bomb maybe 50 times" in his impassioned speech to Axelrod. And Franken hints his anger may have pushed President Barack Obama into finally committing to a House vote on the Senate bill that became Obamacare.

"For Axelrod's part, he didn't take my outburst personally," Franken wrote. "I think it probably helped that after the bill finally passed, I wrote him a nice note. It read, 'You're welcome.'"

kjanssen@chicagotribune.com

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