Top House Democrats on Tuesday introduced a plan to extend the Affordable Care Act’s enhanced tax credits for three years, setting up a fresh partisan battle over healthcare policy as Congress moves to end the weekslong government shutdown under President Donald Trump.
House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries of New York and Minority Whip Katherine Clark of Massachusetts announced they would introduce the proposal as an amendment to the Senate-passed government funding bill at a meeting of the House Rules Committee.
The amendment would continue the expanded premium tax credits that Democrats say are critical to preventing steep insurance premium increases beginning Jan. 1.
“House Republicans: Welcome back from your taxpayer-funded, seven-week vacation,” Jeffries said flippantly Tuesday at the Capitol.
“You now have an opportunity to actually take some action in an area of this healthcare crisis by working with Democrats, before the Rules Committee this evening, to extend the Affordable Care Act tax credits.”
The effort faces near-certain defeat in the GOP-controlled Rules Committee, reflecting Republicans’ long-standing opposition to the Affordable Care Act, enacted in 2010.
The enhanced credits were first expanded in 2021 and 2022 under former President Joe Biden’s pandemic relief legislation and are set to expire at the end of the year.
On Monday, the Senate approved a bipartisan spending measure by a 60-40 vote to reopen the government through Jan. 30, 2026.
The shutdown, now in its seventh week, began when negotiations stalled over Democrats’ insistence that the Affordable Care Act subsidies be renewed instead of the continuing resolution proposed by Republicans.
The bill now moves to the House, where Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., said a vote could occur as early as Wednesday.
Trump has signaled he will sign the stopgap measure once it clears the House, according to administration officials cited by Reuters.
Democrats’ bargaining power weakened over the weekend after seven Democrats and one independent in the Senate backed a bipartisan plan to end the shutdown without extending the subsidies.
That decision prompted backlash from progressives who accused Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., of failing to hold his caucus together.
Jeffries defended Schumer, saying the senator fought “valiantly” to maintain insurance premium credits during the shutdown fight.
Inside the GOP, debate over the subsidies continues.
Many Republicans view the extended credits as costly, while serving some recipients who should not be entitled to the benefit, and others fear that allowing them to lapse could politically backfire.
“We need to deal, as Republicans, with the healthcare issue,” Rep. Jeff Van Drew, R-N.J., said on Fox News.
“We just can’t let the Obamacare thing lapse and do nothing, and people have no healthcare or have to pay double. That’s wrong, it’s counterproductive [and] it’s going to hurt us politically,” Fox News reported.
The House vote, expected midweek, will test whether Republicans can unify behind the funding bill while facing pressure from Democrats determined to keep the Affordable Care Act’s financial support intact.
Information from Reuters was used in this report.
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