WASHINGTON—By a 216-211 party-line vote, the GOP-run House approved a Republican-crafted health care bill that rejects aiding families facing huge health care cost hikes.
Regardless of what happens next, that means millions of people in the U.S. will face premium increases of 100% or more after December 31 if they get their coverage through the Affordable Care Act’s health care exchanges.
And the rest of us will be affected as well, because the House-passed measure leaves intact health care cuts which the ruling Republicans passed on party-line votes earlier this year via GOP President Donald Trump’s so-called Big Beautiful Bill.
Impartial estimates say another 22 million people could lose health care coverage as a result of those cuts. Costs for their “uncompensated care” at hospital emergency rooms as a result would be passed on to insurers and, through the profit-making firms, to the rest of us.
The outcome disappointed a bipartisan “coalition” of 214 Democrats and four Republicans who had forced a floor vote on their competing bill, a straight three-year extension of the ACA’s tax credits, which help families pay for health care. They wanted the vote on December 17.
The four Republicans who signed onto the Democratic bill did so because they represent districts with constituents who will be severely hurt by the GOP bill, and they are in districts where polls show they are likely to lose the midterm elections.
The tax credits expire at midnight on December 31. Democrats wanted their bill brought up before Congress left town for its holiday recess. They didn’t get it.
Trump, in any case, would be likely to veto the Democratic measure if it even made it out of the Senate. He has been calling for sending $1,000 checks to the people to use to buy their own healthcare, an amount that many argue would not cover healthcare costs in America.
The Republican measure, pushed by right-wing Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., and backed by ACA haters in his party and by Trump, contains a patchwork of health care provisions, such as curbing pharmacy benefit managers. But no tax credits.
Johnson successfully pushed a vote on the bipartisan coalition’s alternative off until January, at a date to be determined.
Johnson, of course, is catering to his party’s dominant far-right wing, led by Trump. They hate the ACA and want to abolish it, leaving everyone at the mercy—or lack of it—of the profit-driven, rapacious health insurance industry.
Nothing in Johnson’s GOP bill deals with the looming health care cost hikes, which will hit millions of people when the witching hour strikes. His bill also leaves the field free for the GOP to continue its long campaign to destroy the ACA, also known as Obamacare. The health insurers are also free to milk the ACA—and consumers.
Democrats dominated the floor “debate” such as it was, as few Republicans spoke up for their own legislation. Beforehand, Rep. Brian Fitzpatrick, R-Pa., leader of the four Republican renegades, said “the only policy that is worse than a clean three-year extension without any reforms, is a policy of complete expiration without any bridge.”
The AFL-CIO urged lawmakers to listen to their constituents, not to Trump or to Johnson and the GOP leadership.
“We’re asking lawmakers to put themselves in the shoes of working people. Imagine getting notice that your health insurance costs will more than DOUBLE,” the federation tweeted on BlueSky. “Where do you cut costs? Rent? Groceries? Child care? Congress: It’s time to put workers first and extend the ACA tax credits.”
National Nurses United strongly endorsed extending the ACA tax credits—and against the GOP plan.
“As the House is preparing to vote on the Lower Health Care Premiums For All Americans Act”—the GOP bill—”nurses warn the bill does not extend the ACA subsidies but instead expands junk insurance plans that evade ACA coverage requirements. This bill is a far cry from the relief Americans need,” the union stated.
The GOP hopes ACA premiums will skyrocket so high that people will turn against Obamacare. That hope may be forlorn. The Democrats plan to make health care, and people’s peril, a key issue on the campaign trail next year, and pin the blame squarely on the Republicans.
Public opinion polling shows that, as of right now, the U.S. people aren’t fooled. A Gallup poll, released December 14, shows majorities of Democrats (81%), independents (70%), and Republicans (64%) say the U.S. health care system is “in a state of crisis” or “has major problems.”
Democrats’ negative views about the health care system rose by 10 percentage points in a year, and Republicans’ negativity dropped by seven points. Independents stayed the same. Gallup did not ask respondents to assign blame for the mess.
Failure to extend the tax credit will directly affect 14 million people over the next decade and everyone else indirectly.
The lead House sponsor of the tax credit extension, Rep. Lauren Underwood, D-Ill., a registered nurse and rising party star from the now-purple Chicago suburb of DuPage County, made that point in a party press conference in the morning.
“This health care crisis was created by this Republican majority through their own cruelty and neglect,” she said. “In communities all over the country, working families are learning their health care costs will rise to completely unaffordable levels. People will be sicker, families will be forced into bankruptcy, and our already strained health care system is about to be stretched even further.
“We are staring down a disaster…This is a choice. For months, we have been calling on Republicans to make these savings permanent. But they chose to ignore the issue. They chose to ignore the pleas of working families. All year, at every turn, we have offered solutions for the crisis they have created. We fought ferociously to save health care for the American people.
“This majority has waited far too long to address this issue, and some damage has already been done…There’s no reason, no reason, to extend the anxiety the American people are facing.”
We hope you appreciated this article. At People’s World, we believe news and information should be free and accessible to all, but we need your help. Our journalism is free of corporate influence and paywalls because we are totally reader-supported. Only you, our readers and supporters, make this possible. If you enjoy reading People’s World and the stories we bring you, please support our work by donating or becoming a monthly sustainer today.
CONTRIBUTOR
