Legislation to fund the government will not have a provision guaranteeing money to fund Obamacare subsidies, Speaker Paul Ryan said Wednesday, even as top White House officials were negotiating with Democrats who are pushing to include subsidies.
Democrats had been hoping the spending bill would add language ensuring the subsidies, known as Cost Sharing Reductions or CSRs, are maintained, due to a threat from the Trump administration that it would stop making those payments.
But Ryan, R-Wis., threw cold water on that scenario Wednesday.
“We aren’t doing that,” Ryan told the Washington Examiner. “That’s not in an appropriations bill. That’s something separate that the administration does.”
But Democrats questioned Ryan’s stance and told the Washington Examiner that this arrangement is being negotiated with the White House, which is seeking to win Democratic support for the spending bill.
House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi and Trump’s Office of Management and Budget Director Mick Mulvaney spoke last night at about 7:00 p.m., a Democratic aide said, and Pelosi told Mulvaney that the payments must be included in the spending bill or Democrats will not vote for it. That could threaten passage ahead of a critical April 28 deadline, after which government funding runs out.
According to the aide, Mulvaney told Pelosi the Trump administration has not decided whether to make the May CSR payment to keep the subsidies flowing.
“Mulvaney made clear that, absent congressional action, the judge’s order would stand and the administration would cease making payments,” the Democratic aide said. That order was the result of a Republican lawsuit against the Obama administration over the payments.
Earlier this week, Mulvaney proposed a tradeoff with Democrats that entailed providing equal funding for the CSRs and for the construction of a southern border wall. Some Democrats rejected the idea, arguing the subsidies are part of federal law and should not be negotiated.
Despite this apparent impasse, Ryan said Republicans and Democrats are “getting really close” and are “down to the last final things” on a spending bill to fund the government until Sept. 30, which is the end of the fiscal year.
Despite Friday’s deadline, Ryan would not say whether a stopgap bill would be needed in order to provide more time on a larger deal without the government running out of money in the interim.
“That’s not our intention or goal,” Ryan said, referring to a stopgap bill. “We want to get this done on time.”
Another top lawmaker, House Rules Committee Chairman Pete Sessions, R-Texas, told the Washington Examiner a stopgap bill of at least a week is likely needed at this point.
