{"id":296115,"date":"2025-10-12T01:54:16","date_gmt":"2025-10-12T01:54:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/296115\/"},"modified":"2025-10-12T01:54:16","modified_gmt":"2025-10-12T01:54:16","slug":"healthcare-premium-hike-at-the-root-of-government-shutdown-national-politics","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/296115\/","title":{"rendered":"Healthcare premium hike at the root of government shutdown | National Politics"},"content":{"rendered":"

WASHINGTON<\/strong> \u2014 Heading into its third week, the federal government shutdown is fast turning into another test of U.S. House Speaker Mike Johnson\u2019s leadership of Republicans.<\/p>\n

Saying their work was done, the Benton Republican sent the House home in September and the chamber hasn\u2019t convened since. That left the majority Republican Senate to approve the House-passed resolution that would continue government operations until Thanksgiving.<\/p>\n

Despite daily votes, the Senate can\u2019t drum up enough Democratic support to pass the continuing resolution that would reopen government.<\/p>\n

In the meantime, flights are being canceled and Wednesday\u2019s paychecks for the troops may not be sent.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m a very patient man, but I am angry right now,\u201d Johnson told reporters.<\/p>\n

Democrats want Republicans to negotiate on several issues, but primarily on an extension of the tax credits millions of lower-income workers use<\/a> to buy health care insurance. Democrats say they don\u2019t trust Republicans to negotiate in good faith, absent their leverage to close a government in which the GOP holds all the levers of power.<\/p>\n

Republicans counter that no negotiations are possible until the government reopens.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf the Speaker doesn\u2019t relent and these credits expire, people go bankrupt, people will get sick, some will die. Inaction would be reprehensible, and the Speaker needs to realize that,\u201d said Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, of New York and head of the Senate\u2019s Democratic members.<\/p>\n

House Majority Leader Steve Scalise, R-Jefferson, responded: \u201cReal lives of real people are being disrupted so that Chuck Schumer can show the far-left Marxists in his party that he\u2019s having some kind of tantrum and fighting Donald Trump.”<\/p>\n

The stakes of the health care fight<\/p>\n

If Congress does not take action, the price of health insurance would double for many families, which could cause 3.8 million households to drop their policies, according to the Congressional Budget Office<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Health care insurance premiums that cost an average of $888 in 2025 will cost policyholders $1,904 in 2026, according to a KFF analysis<\/a>\u00a0released last week, unless Congress acts to extend credits for health care insurance on the Affordable Care Act marketplace.<\/p>\n

Johnson argues there is time to address those concerns.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat\u2019s a Dec. 31 issue.\u201d<\/p>\n

Republicans contend that extending the ACA premium tax credits is a complex task with a lot of moving parts that need to be addressed.<\/p>\n

But Democrats point out that those bills are already in the mail. Enrollment begins on November 1.<\/p>\n

The amount of tax credits allotted to each ACA policyholder is set individually through a complex formula that includes household income and policies chosen.<\/p>\n

Very generally, households of four making more than $41,152 annually \u2014 those making less would qualify for Medicaid \u2014 and up to $128,600 can receive some sort of offset for many policies.<\/p>\n

Johnson has 40,773 constituents who have bought insurance through the ACA marketplace, according to KFF<\/a>, a nonpartisan think tank focusing on health care issues. That accounts for roughly 5% of his congressional district.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s a small percentage compared to the 38% of the 767,466 people Johnson represents who are signed up for Medicaid \u2014 one of the nation\u2019s largest concentrations of people on the state-federal insurance for low-income and disabled Americans, according to KFF.<\/p>\n

Apart from the cost \u2014 about $350 billion over the next 10 years \u2014 conservatives argue that the subsidies drive up premium costs for everyone, including those who buy insurance through their employer.<\/p>\n

Additionally, the tax credits that were part of President Barack Obama\u2019s Affordable Care Act were greatly expanded by President Joe Biden in his $1.9 trillion pandemic relief bill, which was passed with only Democratic votes in 2021.<\/p>\n

Biden broadened the income eligibility ceiling on the theory that many would be ousted from Medicaid rolls that had increased during the COVID pandemic. Millions shifted from Medicaid to the ACA marketplace.<\/p>\n

Those tax credit subsidies were set to expire in 2023. The expiration date was then extended in 2022, when Democrats held majorities in both chambers, to the end of this year.<\/p>\n

However tangled the premium tax credit issue, some argue the looming price increases complicate Johnson\u2019s position of ending the shutdown before any meaningful discussions can begin on health care.<\/p>\n

MAGA cheerleader Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, of Georgia, is but one Republican who supports extending ACA subsidies before GOP leadership talks through the matter with Democrats.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m going to go against everyone on this issue because when the tax credits expire this year my own adult children\u2019s insurance premiums for 2026 are going to DOUBLE, along with all the wonderful families and hard-working people in my district,\u201d she wrote last week on X<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Even President Donald Trump hinted last week: \u201cWe are speaking with the Democrats, and some very good things could happen with respect to health care.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"WASHINGTON \u2014 Heading into its third week, the federal government shutdown is fast turning into another test of…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":296116,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[35],"tags":[12351,210,1141,1142,67,132,68],"class_list":{"0":"post-296115","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-health-care","8":"tag-hardwall","9":"tag-health","10":"tag-health-care","11":"tag-healthcare","12":"tag-united-states","13":"tag-unitedstates","14":"tag-us"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115358706099312287","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/296115","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=296115"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/296115\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/296116"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=296115"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=296115"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=296115"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}