I have a GREAT idea. This is absolutely insane, I know, but it might work.
How about we repeal Obamacare!?
No, instead the government wants to stay in health care.
As you know, the Obamacare subsidies will expire soon. Because Obamacare has made insurance so affordable that it needs subsidies!
Senate Democrats killed the Republican plan to replace the subsidies with health savings accounts (HSAs).
The vote was 51 to 48. It needed 60 votes to proceed.
Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) also voted nay.
The plans from Sens. Bill Cassidy (R-LA) and Mike Crapo (R-ID) included “several reforms that Republicans appeared largely unified behind earlier this week.” From Fox News:
Cassidy and Crapo’s plan would have seeded HSAs with $1,000 for people ages 18 to 49 and $1,500 for those 50 to 65 for people earning up to 700% of the poverty level. In order to get the pre-funded HSA, people would have to buy a bronze or catastrophic plan on an Obamacare exchange.It also included several provisions that didn’t make the cut in President Donald Trump’s “big, beautiful bill,” including measures to reduce federal Medicaid funding to states that cover illegal immigrants, requirements that states verify citizenship or eligible immigration status before someone can get Medicaid, a ban on federal Medicaid funding for gender transition services and nixing those services from “essential health benefits” for Obamacare exchange plans.It also included Hyde Amendment provisions to prevent taxpayer dollars from funding abortions through the new HSAs, a red line for many Senate Republicans that has proven divisive between the aisles.
The Democrats’ plan also failed:
That proposal is also expected to fail, given that Senate Republicans broadly don’t want to extend the subsidies without myriad reforms.Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., and Senate Democrats have pitched their plan as the only option to prevent healthcare premiums from skyrocketing, while Republicans contended that the subsidies are rife with fraud and that the entire Obamacare system was causing premium prices to crank up year after year.”The Cassidy-Crapo [plan] is not a healthcare plan,” Schumer said. “It’s not a plan at all. It’s an excuse. It’s a fig leaf. Because Republicans are so divided and can’t come up with a plan that unites them. They propose this fig leaf.””My guess is most Republicans themselves are grimacing that they even have to vote for this thing,” he continued. “How is a one-time check going to help you if you’re paying 1,000 or $2,000 a month more for health insurance?”
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