Jim Geraghty of National Review Online details Democrats’ key role in today’s federal government shutdown.
Whether or not you like the term “hostage taking” in the context of government shutdown fights, one side is withholding support for a continuing resolution to reopen the government, hoping that the bad consequences of the shutdown will force the other side to make a policy concession.
In 2021, Democrats — and only Democrats — passed the American Rescue Plan Act, which created “enhanced premium tax credits” for purchasing health insurance on the exchanges set up under the Affordable Care Act, a.k.a. “Obamacare.” That law temporarily expanded eligibility for premium subsidies to individuals with incomes above 400 percent of the federal poverty line, meaning there was no upper income limit. (For perspective, this year 400 percent of the federal poverty line is $62,600, and for a family of four is $128,600.)
The American Rescue Act also increased the available subsidies. As the Cato Institute reports, “Because health care premiums vary greatly by age, location, and household composition, subsidies can now reach households making hundreds of thousands of dollars, so long as they live in areas with sufficiently high exchange premiums.”
But all of this was temporary, Democrats explained, a short-term generous handout to help Americans deal with the effects of the Covid pandemic.
In 2022, Democrats — and only Democrats — passed the Inflation Reduction Act. That legislation extended those “enhanced premium tax credits” through 2025. But again, Democrats insisted, it was just temporary assistance to get through hard times.
About 24 million Americans buy insurance through the ACA/Obamacare exchanges, and about 92 percent of those receive premium tax credits.
Today, Democrats want these “enhanced premium tax credits” made permanent. …
… That’s $488 billion, or almost half a trillion dollars. That’s the Democrats’ price to “release the hostage.”
Because this kind of move will blow up the deficit and debt, Democrats want a Republican-run House and Senate to make them permanent, even though Democrats chose not to make these tax credits permanent when they had the chance in 2021 or 2022.
