One of the biggest issues in American politics late last year was the expiration of COVID-era subsidies for insurance under the Affordable Care Act (ACA). The expiring subsidies triggered the longest government shutdown in American history last October. While the shutdown ended without a deal to extend the subsidies, the House of Representatives is set to pass a bill extending them for three years.
According to CBS News, after House Speaker Mike Johnson initially refused to hold a vote on extending the subsidies, four House Republicans broke ranks and signed onto a discharge petition that forces a vote on the extension. A procedural vote was held on Wednesday to advance the measure, where five more House Republicans voted in favor of the extension.
“We’ll get this off of the House floor, if the Republicans stay true to their word, and we look forward to passing that in a bipartisan way,” Rep. Pete Aguilar of California, the chairman of the House Democratic Caucus, told reporters on Wednesday.
The majority of Republicans have argued against a clean, three-year extension of the ACA subsidies without reforms, which is why the shutdown ended without a deal to extend them. The Republicans who have broken ranks feel that a clean extension is better than simply letting them expire and drastically raising prices for millions of Americans.
You know, it would’ve been nice if they had this energy in the first place. The subsidies did wind up expiring at the end of last year, with millions of Americans nationwide either paying substantially higher monthly premiums (like ya boy) or being forced to go without insurance because they couldn’t afford the price hike. Truly a bold move by the GOP ahead of the 2026 midterms.
While the bill is expected to pass the House, it will face a difficult journey in the Senate, where Republicans remain staunchly opposed to an extension. After the shutdown, Democrats and Republicans both introduced separate bills to address the expiring ACA subsidies. The Democrats’ bill was a clean extension of ACA subsidies, while the Republican bill created health savings accounts for Bronze-level plans under the ACA. Neither bill received the votes necessary to pass.
Despite that, centrists in both parties have been steadily negotiating a compromise bill that will hopefully address the issue. Republican Sen. Susan Collins of Maine told reporters on Tuesday that “we’re continuing to work hard” on a compromise measure. She added that the bill would likely extend the subsidies for two years, with some mild reforms in the first year, and more substantial reforms in the second.
Even if the Senate gets it together and passes the subsidies, it’s unclear if President Donald Trump would even sign the bill. According to ABC News, Trump expressed just last month that he didn’t want to extend the subsidies.
“I’d like not to be able to do it. I’d like to see us get right into this. I don’t know why we have to extend — this can be done rapidly if the Democrats would come along,” Trump said in the Oval Office. Crazy how the dude who ran on affordability is against Americans, many of whom voted for him, having affordable health care.
SEE ALSO:
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