obamacare

Latest Trump reversal puts GOP in 'no-win position'

After more than a decade of opposing Obamacare’s healthcare subsidies, President Donald Trump is now considering proposing a two-year extension of the soon-to-expire tax credits.

The Hill reports his sudden reversal is putting Republicans in a bind and setting the stage “for GOP leaders in Congress to advance a program they deeply detest after warning for months of its harmful effects.”

“Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) has led Obamacare opposition on Capitol Hill, arguing the program is irredeemable and needs a massive overhaul, if not outright repeal,” reports the Hill. “He and Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.) had refused to negotiate on the Democrats’ demand to extend the subsidies during last month’s fight over government spending — an impasse that led directly to the 43-day shutdown. While Thune promised Senate Democrats a mid-December vote on extending the subsidies, Johnson notably declined to make any such commitment.”

But the subsidies expire Jan. 1, which threatens to spike health care costs for roughly 22 million Americans who currently benefit from them. The Kaiser Family Foundation reports an individual making $28,000 pays around $325 for insurance with the enhanced tax credits in place. But if they expire, this same individual would pay nearly $1,562 annually. Similarly, someone making $45,000 could see their insurance rise an additional $1,836 a year on top of their original cost.

“The deadline has put Republican leaders into a no-win position,” reports the Hill. “If they extend the tax credits, they’ll go on record for the first time augmenting a Democratic law they deem noxious while infuriating a conservative base that’s spent more than 15 years trying to kill it.”

But if they don’t extend the subsidies, the out-of-pocket health costs for millions of voters will skyrocket heading into next year’s midterm elections, “when Republicans are already at risk of losing control of the House,” according to the Hill.

Faced with conservative outcry, the White House reportedly scrapped its plans to unveil the subsidy extension Monday.

Rep. Bob Onder (R-Mo.), a former physician, posted Monday on X that he was “hoping this isn’t true,” referring to reports of Trump’s plan to extend subsidies.

But critics attacked Onder under his post, with one commenter writing that more “average people participate in the [Affordable Care Act] than Democrats. You all are shooting yourselves in the face. Good job! Keep it up!”

The Hill reports GOP centrists are hoping the halt of subsidies is only a delay, not a cancellation, warning that congressional inaction would “spell doom for Republicans at the polls next November." They urge GOP lawmakers to “hold their noses and prevent the cost cliff, even if it flouts their ideological sensibilities.”

“The politics of this are not a close call. With the House hanging by a thread, it is clearly in the interest of Republicans in Congress to avoid this crisis,” former House GOP leadership aide told the Hill.

Mere weeks ago, Trump was “bashing the ACA subsidies as a boondoggle enriching insurance companies at the taxpayers’ expense” reports the Hill.

Read the Hill report at this link.

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Republican from deep-red district rips GOP for last-minute attempt to overhaul Obamacare

Premium costs for Affordable Care Act (ACA, or Obamacare) health insurance plans are set to spike for millions of Americans when federal subsidies expire on Dec. 31. According to a report from Politico, some Republicans in Congress are hitting back against the plan to tackle the issue back by President Donald Trump.

The two options on the table for Congress are to either pass legislation that extends the federal subsidies for Obamacare into the new year, or come up with an alternative healthcare system altogether that more Republicans, in theory, will be able to support. The latter option is currently favored by the president, as he made clear in a Tuesday post to Truth Social.

“THE ONLY HEALTHCARE I WILL SUPPORT OR APPROVE IS SENDING THE MONEY DIRECTLY BACK TO THE PEOPLE, WITH NOTHING GOING TO THE BIG, FAT, RICH INSURANCE COMPANIES, WHO HAVE MADE $TRILLIONS, AND RIPPED OFF AMERICA LONG ENOUGH,” Trump’s post read. “THE PEOPLE WILL BE ALLOWED TO NEGOTIATE AND BUY THEIR OWN, MUCH BETTER, INSURANCE. POWER TO THE PEOPLE! Congress, do not waste your time and energy on anything else. This is the only way to have great Healthcare in America!!! GET IT DONE, NOW.”

According to Politico, this version of the plan — overhauling Obamacare rather than extending subsidies — was the thrust of a presentation recently given by GOP House of Representatives leaders, which included a slide deck titled “The Unaffordable Care Act.”

Despite the president’s backing, several Republican officials attending the presentation expressed frustrations. Rep. Nathaniel Moran (R-Texas) lamented that GOP leaders should have been discussing plans to overhaul the Affordable Care Act “months ago,” instead of waiting until subsidies are only weeks away from expiring.

Several moderate Republicans in competitive swing districts also pushed for the extension of the subsidies in defiance of Trump’s demands.

Over the years, Republicans have been unable to put forward a concrete vision of their proposed Obamacare alternative, despite their frequent calls for it to be repealed. Trump himself infamously said he had only “concepts of plan” for healthcare during a 2024 debate.

Now as ever, Republicans lawmakers have no timeline in place for their desired healthcare bill. Three anonymous sources close to the matter did, however, claim to Politico that several proposals related to the matter are planned to be released before the end of the year.

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'I've let you talk': CNN host cuts off GOP rep in tense exchange

A segment between a CNN host and a Republican member of Congress grew contentious when the lawmaker was repeatedly pressed on what Republicans plan to do about expiring Affordable Care Act (ACA, or Obamacare) tax credits.

On Tuesday, CNN host Briana Keilar interviewed Rep. Mike Lawler (R-N.Y.) about the plight facing millions of Americans who rely on ACA tax credits to be able to afford their health insurance premiums. Many Americans are expecting a significant jump in their monthly premiums should the tax credits not be extended, and Senate Democrats recently failed to include an extension in the legislation that recently passed the chamber to end the ongoing federal government shutdown.

That bill is now headed to the House of Representatives before it goes to President Donald Trump's desk, where House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.) is planning to oppose it given that the ACA credits weren't extended. Keilar needled Lawler with questions about how Republicans plan to address the coming spike in costs for American families who are insured through ACA exchanges, and appeared to grow frustrated with his lack of a concrete answer.

The increase in premiums, even if you don't get subsidies, is pretty nuts, right?" Keilar said. "... How do you tackle that monumental issue of affordability?"

"Health insurance, obviously, is one of the most complex issues facing the country," Lawler responded, listing off multiple criticisms of the ACA. "... [W]hen you look at health insurance, we need more competition. If you only have three, four or five insurance companies available in your state, and you're not actually allowing the free market to work, that drives up costs. So people should be able to purchase health insurance plans across state lines."

"We have a limited amount of time here," Keilar said. "And I hear your ideas ... But these ideas, a lot of them, they aren't new. Congress has had a lot of time to tackle these, Republicans certainly have this idea of repeal and replace. Replace with what? Right? Speaker Johnson told CNN's Kaitlan Collins a couple of weeks ago that Republicans have proposals ready to address health care subsidies. Have you seen anything of substance that is actually ready to go, rather than just kind of throwing out ideas? Because that's really tough to make into action at this point in time."

"Well, again, I was walking through a series of bills that we can actually bring forth immediately. And I would support, I'm not advocating those proposals—" Lawler said before Keilar interjected.

"Let me — excuse me, because I've let you talk a lot — I want to ask you this," she said. "... Is there anything like on paper that is ready to go, not just ideas of bills that could be introduced, I mean, is there is there stuff that is ready to go out the gate?"

"Well, again, we have multiple committees that deal with health, healthcare and health insurance, Energy and Commerce, and Ways and Means—"

"—And how far are we away from a markup?" Keilar asked, referring to the legislative process of finalizing a bill in committee before it goes to the full floor for a vote.

"Okay, can you let me answer the question?" Lawler snapped. "Both of which have hundreds of bills that have been introduced that can absolutely be brought to markup. When you're talking about these issues, they are extremely complex and trying to unwind, frankly, the damage that has been done to the insurance market by many of the provisions of Obamacare is no small task."

Watch the segment below:

- YouTube www.youtube.com

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CNN host rolls the tape on Trump’s decade-long failure to fix healthcare

CNN anchor Dana Bash found it interesting that Republicans have managed to evade devising a replacement for The Affordable Health Care Act (Obamacare) since President Obama signed the plan into existence in 2010.

“It's kind of amazing that we're still talking about Obamacare. And it is also amazing that Republicans still — even though they don't like it — don’t have an alternative. We're going to go to break. But before we do, I want to go in the CNN inside politics wayback machine. Ten years ago, it is the Republican primary, one of the Republican primary debates. I'm asking then candidate Donald Trump (for his first term run] about his health care plan.”

“Will you talk a little bit more about your plan [for replacing Obamacare]?” Bash asked candidate Trump in the old footage.

“There’s going to be many different plans, because there's going to be competition,” Trump answered.

“Can you get into anything specific?” Bash pressed.

“There's going to be competition. There is going to be competition among all of the states and the insurance companies,” Trump repeated. “They're going to have many, many different plans.”

Unconvinced, Bash asked Trump if “there anything else you would like to add to that?”

“No, there's nothing to add. What's to add?” Trump asked impatiently.

“He's not alone,” Bash told the CNN panel after ending the clip. “Republicans have not come up with an alternative for Obamacare in, what, 15 years? So that is part of the story here.”

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Healthcare premiums to bonce 'about 75 percent' in red state if subsidies expire

The state of Idaho, which voted 66 percent for President Donald Trump, is one of the first states to see the benefits of its vote, according to the New Republic.

The ongoing government shutdown recently gave Idahoans a glimpse of life without Obamacare federal tax credits on the state’s Affordable Care Act portal.

“On average, gross premiums, or the overall cost of the premium, has gone up about 10 percent. And the net premium, or the amount the consumer pays after the tax credit has been applied, has increased about 75 percent,” said Your Health Idaho Executive Director Pat Kelly, according to New Republic writer Ellie Quinlan Houghtaling.

“So, those are averages across all of our enrollees, but it does give an indication of overall increase and then increase to what the consumer actually pays [without credits],” Kelly added.

The subsidies, created through the American Rescue Plan Act in 2021, allowed households making more than 400 percent of the federal poverty level to qualify for lowered premiums. That includes a single person making $62,600, or a family of four generating nearly $130,600 in revenue.

The New Republic reports Idaho has roughly 135,000 enrollees on the marketplace, more than 6 percent of the state population. Of those, about 13,000 fall within that salary bracket and are at risk of no longer receiving the credits should Congress fail to act.

Idaho is by no means the only state about to feel this pain, said Houghtaling. More than a dozen states have opened up their Obamacare marketplace for a window-shopping period, including California, Georgia, Kentucky, Nevada, Maryland, and Maine. The revealing peek let customers in those states see the new prices waiting for them should President Donald Trump and Republicans allow the subsidies to expire.

“People in Wyoming, West Virginia, Connecticut, and Illinois can expect the largest differential in their monthly premiums, rising anywhere from 535 percent to nearly 700 percent,” said Houghtaling.

The result could be a mass exodus from Obamacare plans that could leave four million Americans uninsured and hospitals struggling to afford uninsured patients.

Low-income regions of the country, including Mississippi, Tennessee and South Carolina will be particularly hard-hit.

Read the New Republic report at this link.

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'At least 5 votes': Unlikely pair of Supreme Court justices look ready to save Obamacare

Americans recently celebrated the 15th anniversary of the Affordable Care Act — former President Barack Obama's landmark healthcare reform legislation known as "Obamacare" — being signed into law. And two Supreme Court justices appear poised to protect it in a forthcoming decision.

Vox's Ian Millhiser reported that the case Kennedy v. Braidwood Management, Inc. could yield a surprising result in that two conservative members of the High Court may join the three liberal justices in upholding a key portion of the Affordable Care Act according to oral arguments held Monday. According to Millhiser, Justices Amy Coney Barrett and Brett Kavanaugh — who Trump appointed in 2020 and 2018, respectively — have indicated a willingness to back a requirement that health insurance companies cover some preventative care procedures.

The Kennedy v. Braidwood case made its to the Supreme Court after the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) and Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. sued over a provision of the ACA that requires the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force (or PSTF, which is under HHS' umbrella) to mandate that certain treatments be covered by all insurance plans.

These treatments include cancer screenings, drugs that prevent transmission of HIV and eye ointments that prevent infections that can cause blindness in infants. Should the HHS prevail in the case, it would strip the PSTF of the ability to require insurance companies to pay for these treatments as the ACA currently allows.

Millhiser opined that during Monday's oral arguments, Justices Barrett and Kavanaugh asked questions of the HHS' attorney that led him to believe they could side with liberal Justices Ketanji Brown Jackson, Elena Kagan and Sonia Sotomayor. He noted that Justices Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito appeared to be on the side of President Donald Trump's HHS, while Chief Justice John Roberts was "silent for most of the argument.

"All three of the Court’s Democrats appeared all but certain to uphold the PSTF, so that means there may be at least five votes to preserve health insurers’ obligations under Obamacare," Millhiser wrote.

Even though the Supreme Court is the final appeals court in the U.S., Millhiser observed that it was possible the Court may end up kicking the case back down to the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals to iron out details about how the HHS secretary's powers to hire and fire pertain to the PSTF. Millhiser characterized that as "bad news" for the PSTF, given the 5th Circuit's reputation as one of the most conservative courts in the country.

Click here to read Millhiser's full article.

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Johnson tries to backtrack after 'no Obamacare' backlash

Speaker Mike Johnson is now insisting that when he told supporters “no Obamacare,” he wasn’t suggesting that Republicans would push to repeal the Affordable Care Act. His remarks sparked a massive backlash online.

On Monday, in the hotly-contested battleground state of Pennsylvania, Johnson had said “no Obamacare,” referring to the Affordable Care Act, which covers tens of millions of Americans, has dramatically slashed the number of uninsured Americans, and offers widespread protections to over 133 million people in America.

“Health care reform’s going to be a big part of the agenda. When I say we’re going to have a very aggressive first 100 days agenda, we got a lot of things still on the table,” Speaker Johnson told an attendee at a GOP candidate’s meeting, according to an NBC News report and video Tuesday.

“We have a ‘docs caucus,’ physicians who serve in the House, and they’ve got a menu of options about this thick and I think this is part of it, because if you take government bureaucrats out of the health care equation and you have doctor-patient relationships, it’s better for everybody, more efficient, more effective, that’s the free market,” Johnson explained. “Trump’s gonna be for the free market.”

Johnson did not explain how Obamacare (or any federal health care system, including Medicare) could survive without “government bureaucrats.”

“No Obamacare?” an attendee asked.

“No Obamacare,” Johnson responded, raising his eyes before explaining how Donald Trump wants to “go big” in removing regulations.

“We want to take a blowtorch to the regulatory state,” Johnson said. “These agencies have been weaponized against the people, it’s crushing the free market; it’s like a boot on the neck of job creators and entrepreneurs and risk takers. And so health care is one of the sectors but we need this across the board.”

“And Trump’s going to go big. I mean, he’s only going to have one more term, right? Can’t run for re-election. And so he’s going to be thinking about legacy and we’re going to fix these things.”

NBC News’ Sahil Kapur on Wednesday reported Johnson’s office pushed back after the Harris campaign issued a statement citing Johnson’s remarks. But Kapur also noted that Donald Trump has said he wants to kill Obamacare.

“And remember,” Kapur said on “Morning Joe,” “all of this comes in context of Donald Trump promising to replace the ACA to finish the job he tried and failed in his first term when he attempted with Mike Johnson’s help to pass a bill that would roll back the 2010 law.”

Late Thursday morning Donald Trump posted an angry statement on his Truth Social website:

“Lyin’ Kamala is giving a News Conference now, saying that I want to end the Affordable Care Act. I never mentioned doing that, never even thought about such a thing. She also said I want to end Social Security. Likewise, never mentioned it, or thought of it. She is the one that wants to end Social Security and, she will do it, by putting the millions of Migrants coming into our Country into it. Kamala is a LIAR! Everything that comes out of her mouth is a LIE. It’s MADE UP FICTION, and she’s doing it because she’s losing, and losing BIG!”

Kapur notes, “As president, Trump fought to repeal ACA via legislation, undo regulations via executive action and nuke it via SCOTUS. Last month he called ACA ‘lousy’ and said ‘we’re going to replace it.'”

Also, as President, Trump celebrated when the House passed legislation repealing the entire Affordable Care Act, as the Biden administration’s Director of the Domestic Policy Council noted just hours ago:

Meanwhile, on Thursday, Johnson pushed back even harder, while complaining to Fox Business, “they’re twisting our words.”

“I was at one of these events in Pennsylvania a few days ago, and a question came up about Obamacare, and I answered it very specifically,” Johnson claimed, not mentioning he had said, “No Obamacare.”

“I said the ACA, unfortunately, is deeply ingrained in our health care system now. Do we need further improvements? Absolutely. We need to expand quality of care, access to care, and obviously lower the cost of healthcare. And I started talking about that. Well, they they took a clip out of context and said that I, said we were promising to repeal Obamacare.”

“That’s just not what I said, it’s actually the opposite of that,” Johnson continued to claim, “and so, that’s just another example of what, they have nothing to run on. They have no policies of their own, and they’re twisting our words.”

The Harris campaign has an entire section on issues, and over 80 pages of polices on its website.

Watch the video below or at this link.

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Trump’s call to repeal Obamacare blasted as 'outlandish' as signups hit new record high

The Affordable Care Act (ACA) — also referred to as "Obamacare" after the president who signed it into law — remains incredibly popular across the US. However, former President Donald Trump has not backed down from calls to repeal it.

According to the Washington Post, signups for health insurance plans made possible by the ACA have now exceeded 21 million, which is a new record. That's an increase of roughly five million compared to 2023 data, and the third consecutive year that Obamacare enrollments have broken previous records. Advocates are blasting former President Donald Trump's repeated calls to abolish the act as both counterproductive for working-class Americans and lacking political savvy.

"At a time when more Americans are enrolling in the ACA than ever before, it is outlandish that the likely GOP nominee is even considering another attempt at repeal," Brad Woodhouse, who is executive director of the progressive nonprofit Protect Our Care, told the Post.

POLL: Should Trump be allowed to hold office again?

One of the more popular elements of the ACA is its expansion of state-funded Medicaid programs, allowing more middle-class Americans to obtain subsidies to buy health insurance based on their income level. During the Covid-19 pandemic, roughly 95 million Americans used Medicaid due to federal protections that kept Americans from losing their health coverage.

Obamacare is popular even with Republicans, according to a survey by the Kaiser Family Foundation (KFF). In a December survey, the KFF found that roughly three in five voters — including one in five Republicans — actually trust Democrats more than Republicans with the future of the ACA.

The former president has assailed his Democratic predecessor's chief legislative accomplishment numerous times on his Truth Social, saying the legislation "SUCKS" and vowing to "REPLACE IT with MUCH BETTER HEALTHCARE." He has so far not yet specified what he would replace it with.

In his first year as president, Trump attempted to fulfill a campaign promise to repeal the ACA, as he had Republican majorities in both chambers of Congress. However, the GOP's anti-Obamacare efforts were stymied by the late Sen. John McCain (R-Arizona), who flew back to Washington after undergoing surgery to cast the deciding vote to kill the repeal legislation. His famous thumbs-down gesture spawned a viral WWE-style meme.

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Obamacare popularity near all-time high despite Trump’s calls for repeal

A new poll by the Kaiser Family Foundation shows that Americans' support for the Affordable Care Act (ACA) — also known as Obamacare — is surging, making former President Donald Trump's recent call to repeal it even more politically risky.

Politico reported on the poll Saturday, which gauged Americans' support for the 2010 healthcare reform law along with other health-related topics, including Medicare, Medicaid and abortion. Kaiser found that Obamacare's popularity was not only big among both Democrats and independents, but that it was even growing on Republicans. The last time the ACA's popularity was surveyed, 26% of Republicans had a favorable opinion of it, compared to just 16% of Republicans supporting the law when Republicans unsuccessfully tried to repeal it in 2017 despite holding majorities in both chambers of Congress.

"Republican voters weren’t itching for [Trump] to come out and make a statement on the ACA," Ashley Kirzinger, the Kaiser Family Foundation's (KFF) director of survey methodology, told Politico.

POLL: Should Trump be allowed to hold office again?

Politico also analyzed previous KFF polling data and found that Americans' overall favorability for Obamacare is hovering just shy of 60%, with nearly all Democrats supporting it, and 62% of independents viewing the law in a positive light. That's its second-highest approval rating ever, with the ACA registering slightly higher numbers earlier in 2023. Democrats are far more eager to publicly debate the merits of the ACA, with 70% of Democratic-leaning respondents telling KFF in its latest poll that they felt it was "very important" for candidates to discuss it, with only 32% of Republican survey participants saying the same.

In 2016, Trump ran on repealing Obamacare, yet failed to do so during his first year in office, when Sen. John McCain (R-Arizona) showed up at the last minute after undergoing brain cancer treatment to save the ACA (which spawned a famous WWE-inspired meme). However, the ex-president has not relented in his efforts to torpedo the popular legislation, promising in a Truth Social post to "REPLACE IT with MUCH BETTER HEALTHCARE."

"Obamacare Sucks!!!" The 45th president of the United States wrote early Wednesday morning.

Senate Republicans were lukewarm about Trump's pledge to repeal the popular law, with Sen. Mitt Romney (R-Utah) likening it to "so much spaghetti on the wall" and Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine) lauding Obamacare's protections for Americans with pre-existing conditions.

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A federal judge just smacked down Trump's Obamacare sabotage for the second time this week

President Donald Trump received a blow on Tuesday when a federal judge struck down strict Medicaid work requirements in Kentucky and Arkansas. The ruling set back the administration's efforts to let states waive Medicaid rules to disenroll thousands of people and sabotage the Medicaid expansion of the Affordable Care Act, commonly known as "Obamacare."

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