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We’ve been here before: congressional Democrats and Republicans sparring over the future of the Affordable Care Act. But this time there’s an extra complication. Though it’s the middle of open enrollment, lawmakers are still debating whether to extend the subsidies that have given consumers extra help paying their health insurance premiums in recent years. The circumstances have led to deep consumer concerns about higher costs and fears of political fallout among some Republican lawmakers.

Remember how Democrats shut the government down to squeeze out three more years of Obamacare subsidies for illegal aliens? Well, a fresh report from the Government Accountability Office throws a harsh spotlight on what they were really defending. Investigators set up fake applicants and let the federal marketplace do its thing. The system welcomed them with open arms. Officials approved subsidies for 90% of those phantoms. That’s a hit rate that would make any scam artist proud. GAO agents went undercover and flagged serious “fraud risks” in the advance premium tax credits. Their findings reveal the true prize Democrats fought...

The debate over expiring Obamacare subsidies has dominated national political discourse, but some experts told the Daily Caller News Foundation that Republicans could capitalize on growing momentum around price transparency to help lower healthcare costs for Americans. The record-setting government shutdown was driven by Democrats’ refusal to budge on the expiring Obamacare premium subsidies, which they passed in 2021 without GOP support and set to expire at the end of 2025. Republicans are still debating their healthcare proposal, including whether to back a limited extension of those subsidies. Even without a resolution on the subsidies in sight, some experts note...

The White House is poised to put forward a two-year extension for the Obamacare subsidies set to expire at the end of the month. Trump’s plan will attempt to take the healthcare issue off the table ahead of the midterm elections. Healthcare was a key part of Democrats’ successful campaign in the 2018 midterm elections. Trump’s proposal for ACA subsidies will include potential caps on income, limiting the recipients of the program, while also requiring that all enrollees pay some premium. According to the healthcare non-profit KFF, should the subsidies lapse, premiums will double for Americans and an additional 2...

President Donald Trump is delaying a planned announcement of a proposal to extend Affordable Care Act subsidies, according to two White House officials, after congressional Republicans pushed back against the president’s sudden embrace of the expiring subsidies. Trump was expected to unveil a plan aimed at halting ACA premium spikes on Monday, as first reported by MS NOW. But the reveal has been postponed — though not canceled — said the White House officials, who were granted anonymity to discuss the internal strategy. Both White House officials noted that Trump’s announcement — which was never officially on the schedule —...

The act’s supporters said it would achieve the long-sought goal of universal health insurance while preserving the high quality and freedom of choice that are the hallmarks of America’s health care system. Peter Ferrara says the act’s supporters are wrong. “Obamacare,” he writes in the conclusion to this Heartland Policy Study, “is a disaster. Rather than liberate the American health care system from bureaucracy and waste, it blankets it with more of both, suffocating innovation and destroying freedom. The result is a system that is inconsistent with the freedom, prosperity, high living standards, and traditions of the American people.” Ferrara...

Taxpayers are footing the bill for up to $30 billion in fraudulent payments, one expert told The Daily Wire.Though the government shutdown has ended, the fight over Obamacare is still raging. Democrats want to extend and renew the Affordable Care Act’s expanded COVID-era subsidies, which are set to expire on December 31. Doing so would cost American taxpayers hundreds of billions of dollars over the next decade. Republicans want to let the subsidies lapse, and find a way to reform America’s healthcare system. Ryan Long, Senior Research Fellow at the Paragon Health Institute, told The Daily Wire that the expanded...

Stacy Cox used one word repeatedly as she described how she felt after learning her ACA premium could jump over 300% without the enhanced tax credits: "devastating." "I don't know if I've ever cried opening a letter from an insurance or before, but it happened this time," she told ABC News. Cox's premium this year has been $495.32 for coverage for her and her husband. Without the credit in 2026, she was informed that it's increasing to $2,168.68. "It's devastating because we can't afford that," she said. "Just that bill right there, that's more than our mortgage, our insurance, most...

A new analysis published by the nonpartisan Center on Budget and Policy Priorities (CBPP) found that out-of-pocket premium payments will more than double if ObamaCare’s enhanced premium tax credits expire. According to the CBPP’s projections, annual out-of-pocket premium payments would more than double, exceeding $1,000 on average if the credits aren’t extended. Open enrollment for Affordable Care Act (ACA) Marketplace plans begins this Saturday. “Since Congress has not acted sooner and many enrollees likely have already experienced sticker shock and decided not to enroll, it should also extend the open enrollment period (scheduled to end January 15 in most states)...

Groups on the left know full well that allowing the enhanced subsidies to expire as scheduled wouldn’t cause a catastrophe for most families. As the government shutdown winds on, Democrats continue to hold the federal government hostage because, they claim, “premiums will double” if Congress does not extend Covid-era enhanced Obamacare subsidies. I’ve debunked that topic in detail here and elsewhere, but to quickly summarize the argument: 1) The federal government will still pay on average 75-80 percent of enrollees’ premiums if the enhanced subsidies expire. 2) Nearly half of Exchange enrollees currently pay nothing in out-of-pocket premiums for benchmark...

Remember how Democrats once hailed ObamaCare as a "big f---ing deal?"Nowadays, as inadvertently revealed by Politico, many Democrats have turned their backs on the 15-year-old program they have come to loathe (while urging continued funding for it) and instead increasingly demand its replacement with Medicare For All.On Sunday, Politico reporters Lisa Kashinsky and Elena Schneider revealed the deep Democrat discontent with ObamaCare in "Democrats are united in bashing GOP on Obamacare. Medicare for All could reopen a rift."The article began with how fervently many Democrats are in their desire to ditch ObamaCare in favor of the entirely government-financed Medicare For...

When insurance costs more than survival, coverage is just a word. Obamacare didn’t protect families, it priced them into submission. A system that only works for the rich or the dependent is not a safety net. ====================================================================================== BRIEFING It’s been just over a decade since Obamacare was implemented, and for a majority of Americans, it’s done jack diddly squat for them. As a matter of fact, one American family sat down, did the Obamacare math honestly, and realized that working, paying premiums, and playing by the rules still left them staring at a literal dead end. Let’s break it down....

President Donald Trump has reopened the healthcare debate with a mix of ideas that do not align. He has pledged to “terminate” Obamacare, then signaled openness to extending ACA subsidies, then endorsed personal freedom accounts that would send money directly to individuals. These proposals represent very different diagnoses of what is wrong with American health care. No serious reform effort can point in contradictory directions. But this problem extends far beyond Trump. Republicans have offered inconsistent signals, with some now willing to extend ACA subsidies again despite a decade of arguing – correctly – that these subsidies inflate premiums and...

House Republicans passed a bill they say will lower healthcare costs for a broad swath of Americans by roughly 11%. It's a victory for Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., who has been managing deep divisions within the House GOP on the topic of healthcare as insurance premiums are set to spike across the country in a matter of weeks. One glaring issue that remains unresolved is Obamacare subsidies, which were enhanced during the COVID-19 pandemic but are set to expire at the end of this year. The legislation passed 216 to 211. Just one Republican, Rep. Thomas Massie, R-Ky., voted against...

Four moderate House Republicans are rebelling against Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., to join his Democratic counterpart in forcing a vote on enhanced Obamacare subsidies set to expire at the end of this year. Reps. Brian Fitzpatrick, R-Pa., Ryan Mackenzie, R-Pa., Rob Bresnahan, R-Pa., and Mike Lawler, R-N.Y., all joined a discharge petition by House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y., on his push for a three-year extension of the subsidies. A discharge petition is a mechanism for overriding the will of House leaders to get a chamber-wide vote on specific legislation, provided it has support from a majority of lawmakers. In...

While members of the U.S. Senate continue to battle over whether to extend enhanced Affordable Care Act (ACA) subsidies just days before they expire, Speaker of the House Mike Johnson (R-LA) is sharing some harsh truths. Johnson, in a post on X, recalled how Democrats sold the ACA to the American people as a form of relief that would lower their health care premium costs but instead has raised those premium costs 3 times faster than the the rate of inflation. The Speaker shared a chart showing how, since 2014, premium costs on the ACA exchange have risen twice as...

A few weeks ago, I gave the Republican Party some unsolicited advice about what they should do if they want to get back into the saddle and start winning elections again after this year’s string of off-season/special election losses. Essentially it boiled down to using power to fight the Democrats while giving your own client base the things that it wants. In other words, what people throughout history, in every era, in every type of political system from the most despotic to the most egalitarian, would recognise as basic political acumen. The Democrats, despite their complete disconnection from several basic...

House Republicans released legislation Friday aimed at lowering healthcare costs through expanded insurance options for small businesses and unprecedented transparency requirements for pharmacy benefit managers, setting up a crucial vote next week as enhanced Obamacare subsidies expire at year’s end.The Lower Health Care Premiums for All Americans Act, introduced by Rep. Mariannette Miller-Meeks (R-Iowa-01), is the GOP's alternative to Democratic proposals as Democrats push to extend expiring ACA premium tax credits that help 22 million Americans purchase insurance.Speaker Mike Johnson announced the measure would receive a floor vote next week, though GOP leadership indicated moderate Republicans seeking subsidy extensions may...

...talks in Berlin this weekend involving White House envoy Steve Witkoff, Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelensky and... Democrat Congressman speaking of photos from the Jeffrey Epstein Estate depicting...sex acts... The US Treasury lifting sanctions on controversial Brazilian Supreme Court Justice... One person killed during a Ukrainian drone attack... Two new US government reports are out concerning the troubled V-22 Osprey... House Republicans introducing their version of Obamacare extension... A US special forces team raided a Chinese merchant vessel...headed for Iran... Trump says there is agreement between Thailand and Cambodia... International Criminal Court prosecutor ousted after his arrest warrants for Israeli... Germany...

A Republican-drafted proposal to set up health savings accounts for people who buy their health insurance on the Affordable Care Act (ACA) marketplace failed to advance on a largely party-line vote Thursday, The legislation, which needed 60 votes to advance, failed by a vote of 51 to 48. Every Democrat voted against it. Sen. Rand Paul (Ky.) was the only Republican to vote “no.” Paul argued in a post on social platform X that funneling ACA subsidies into HSAs instead of to insurance companies “may be a slight improvement.” “But it’s still a vote for ObamaCare — something conservatives would...