Americans have made it abundantly clear that they want relief from soaring healthcare costs. But Congress is bizarrely refusing to listen. Instead of actually lowering premiums, Democrats and a handful of Republicans are fighting to give health insurance companies a massive handout.
These lawmakers aren’t just refusing to solve the problem. They’re trying to make the public’s pain even worse.
That’s the reality of the so-called “deal” that Congress is trying to find on Obamacare subsidies. President Joe Biden massively expanded them in 2021, supposedly on a temporary basis during the COVID-19 pandemic. But now lawmakers are trying to extend them or even make them permanent. But the bigger subsidies drove costs higher, because insurance companies knew they could raise premiums and profit off taxpayers. It happens every time Washington throws money at special interests. If the feds had been subsidizing televisions for the past 20 years, they would now cost more than cars.
The good news is that President Donald Trump is telling Congress that any such deal is dead on arrival on his desk. He’s right: Americans need relief, not insurance companies.
Insurers have been profiting off Obamacare from the start, all at the expense of the people. In the past decade, its premiums have soared by nearly 170%. That’s four times faster than the rate of inflation. And the supposedly temporary Biden subsidies only made things worse, encouraging insurers to continually raise premiums. Premiums rose by 26% heading into this 2026 alone — a massive jump in a single year.
While it’s tempting to blame rising costs on things like prescription drugs, the data show that drug prices only rose by 4% between last year and this year. Nor is it true that Obamacare recipients are using their plans more often. The number of people who didn’t use their plan at all tripled from 2021 to 2024. Insurers also denied 106 million claims for Obamacare plans in 2023 — 20% of all treatment that Americans received under the law, compared to 14% for non-ObamaCare plans. But insurance companies still pocketed tens of billions of dollars while raising premiums.
Doubling down on this failed system makes zero sense. It’s all pain for policyholders, who face mounting premiums even as they get support. It’s also pain for taxpayers, who will be on the hook for $350 billion over the next decade if the bigger subsidies are extended. But all the gain will go to insurers. Congress could hardly come up with a more backward plan to make healthcare affordable. Nothing of the kind will happen.
Real healthcare reform starts by realizing that the current system is broken. Congress should be looking to lower premiums — actually lower them, not paper over price hikes with endless taxpayer subsidies. If Congress is going to make that happen, it shouldn’t just reject a deal on bigger Obamacare subsidies. Lawmakers should also get serious about tackling waste, fraud, and abuse.
From the beginning, Obamacare has been a gold mine for fraud. The IRS recently estimated that at least 60% of the people getting bigger subsidies — the ones Congress wants to extend — didn’t accurately report their income. Obamacare also encourages dishonest brokers to sign people up without their knowledge, since the brokers can get $1,200 for every family they enroll. One broker was recently convicted of a $233 million Obamacare fraud scheme.
But fraud isn’t just rampant in Obamacare. Over the next eight years, Medicare Advantage plans are expected to overpay more than a trillion dollars. No wonder: These plans are known to cover expenses such as golf equipment, ski passes, and pet supplies. This isn’t healthcare. It’s the organized looting of the people, who pay taxes to keep premiums low, only to pay higher premiums when insurers raise rates anyway.
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COVID-19 may be over, but temporary spending seemingly never ends. Congress has a chance to break this cycle and fulfill campaign promises to address our $38 trillion national debt. Lawmakers should focus on cutting wasteful spending, not rewarding it. The president is right to focus on real reforms that give Americans, not insurance companies, financial relief.
Chase Martin is chairman of American Resolve.
