Senate Republicans are lambasting an offer by Democrats to extend Affordable Care Act (ACA) subsidies for one year as part of a deal to reopen the government, arguing there is little to no appetite for such an agreement.
Multiple members of the Senate GOP were quick to pan the proposal — which Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) had offered on the Senate floor just hours earlier and which includes a short-term funding stopgap, an attached three-bill “minibus” and the extension of tax credits — as unserious.
“It’s terrible,” said Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), who was on the way to a Senate GOP conference meeting to discuss the path forward.
“The five largest health care companies in America have had a 1,000 percent increase in their stock prices since 2010. We’re flooding these people with money that’s creating inflation,” Graham continued. “The program is broken, and I’m not going to keep giving hundreds of billions of dollars to insurance companies.”
Republicans have said throughout the shutdown they would only negotiate on health care after the government reopened. Democrats, meanwhile, had made extending the ACA subsidies their central ask.
Schumer announced the proposal the day after bipartisan talks that had been ongoing this week fell apart.
A group of moderate Democrats were nearing a deal with Republicans that included a stopgap spending bill, an attached minibus and a commitment to hold a vote on a bill to extend ACA subsidies by a certain date.
Negotiators, however, began singing a different tune early Thursday afternoon, as they indicated a deal was not close. That was followed by a Democratic caucus meeting that led the party to seek more concessions from Republicans.
Led by the one-year ACA tax credits extension, the new offer was rejected swiftly by the GOP.
“Everybody who follows this knows that’s a nonstarter,” Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.) said. “There is no way. The ObamaCare extension is the negotiation. That’s what we’re going to negotiate once the government opens up.”
“A one-year extension along the lines of what they’re suggesting … it just doesn’t even get close,” Thune said, adding the Democratic offer also does not include protections for the Hyde Amendment, which bars the use of federal funds to pay for abortions.
Thune said the proposal is evidence Democrats are “feeling the heat.”
House Republicans were also quick to slam the offer.
Rep. August Pfluger, (R-Texas), chair of the Republican Study Committee, called it a “nonstarter” while the hardline conservative House Freedom Caucus said it was “absurd.”
House Democrats, meanwhile, appeared to back the offer.
One top aide said Democratic offices have been discussing the offer this afternoon, “and most seem to think it’d be an acceptable off-ramp.”
“It would meet the promise to constituents and put us in good position going forward,” the aide said.
The proposal also came days after Democrats saw massive wins at the ballot box, opening up a fissure for Republicans and encouraging the minority party to dig in.
President Trump declared Wednesday that the shutdown had hurt the GOP in the elections, buoying progressives to keep up the fight for a subsidy extension, with Republicans seemingly on the back foot.
Progressives also were not in favor of the deal at the center of bipartisan talks, having insisted they want an outcome on the tax credits rather than a process that would include a likely failed vote.
Emily Brooks and Mike Lillis contributed.
