Congressional Democrats are demanding healthcare concessions from Republicans to get their support on a spending deal ahead of a government shutdown, which looms at the end of the month.
As congressional leaders negotiate a short-term continuing resolution, likely to be a three-month extension, House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY) and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) said there is a rising national healthcare crisis, and they would need to see it addressed in any CR deal coming to the floor.
REPUBLICANS INCH CLOSER TO SHORT-TERM FUNDING DEAL AS TIME IS RUNNING OUT
“House and Senate, Hakeem and I, are in total agreement: what the Republicans are proposing is not good enough for the American people and not good enough to get our votes,” Schumer said, leaving a Thursday meeting with other top Democrats. “The American people are hurting, healthcare is being decimated on all different fronts, people are going to die, people are losing jobs, people are losing healthcare.”
Schumer added that Democrats are “totally united” and Republicans need to come to the table for bipartisan negotiation — “or they won’t get our votes, plain and simple.”
Jeffries echoed the Senate Democratic leader, stating that House Democrats will “not support a partisan spending agreement … period. Full stop.”
This is the latest red line Democrats have drawn as time is running out to fund the government by Sept. 30. Appropriators have said the most likely plan of action is a three-month CR combined with a three-bill “minibus” package approved by the Senate.
In the wake of passing the “big, beautiful bill” that made significant changes to Medicaid, Democrats have said they want Republicans to address how they will fix what they say is a rip-off of healthcare for millions of Americans.
Democrats and some Republicans have also raised the possibility of adding language that would extend expanded tax credits for Obamacare health premiums, which expire at the end of this year.
Reauthorizing the enhanced Affordable Care Act credits has received little support from the Republican conference in both chambers of Congress, but some GOP lawmakers are bolstering Democrats’ demands to include them in government funding discussions.
Concessions on Medicaid and on the ACA tax subsidies are the two major issues for which Democrats are putting their foot down.
“The American people are hurting because of how they have decimated healthcare — we need bipartisan negotiation to undo that damage,” Schumer said. “If they try to jam something down our throats without any compromise, without any compromise, without any real bipartisan discussion, they ain’t going to get the votes, plain and simple.”
But House Republicans, including those who are already on the fence about a short-term CR, are shutting down talk of including the ACA subsidies in a spending deal.
Freedom Caucus Chairman Andy Harris (R-MD) said the offer on the table to extend the tax credits is “crazy.”
“If that’s included in this CR that’s proposed next week, all hell will break loose on the House floor,” Harris told reporters.
Rescissions packages from the White House have also staved off any Democrats’ wishes to help Republicans pass a spending deal, as many argue that they won’t vote for appropriations legislation to have the appropriated dollars rescinded by the Trump administration.
“My Republican colleagues are very aware of the issues. I’ve particularly been saying that from the onset, we’ll negotiate anytime, any place. [The] Democratic priorities: protecting and stop stealing the funds that we’ve appropriated,” House Appropriations ranking member Rosa DeLauro (D-CT) said leaving Thursday’s meeting.
Harris, along with other fiscal hawks, has been in favor of a year-long CR to January, but top appropriators have argued that a short-term CR keeps the pressure on the House and Senate Appropriations Committees to pass all 12 funding bills for the fiscal year.
House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) can only afford to lose two GOP votes on a spending deal and still pass the package along party lines. With no Democratic support, and many conservatives balking at the idea of a short-term deal, Johnson and House leaders will need to work overtime to convince fiscal hawks to back the legislation.
REPUBLICANS BOOST DEMOCRATS’ DEMANDS TO EXTEND OBAMACARE SUBSIDIES
GOP leadership has insisted that Democrats are responsible for any shutdown, but DeLauro and other Democrats say they are still advocating for Republicans to come to the table and negotiate.
“The House bills have all been unilaterally partisan,” DeLauro said. “I will say on the Senate side that their bills that come out have been bipartisan. We need to get to a bipartisan negotiation on appropriations bills, as well as on a continued resolution.”
