Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer laid out a new Democratic counterproposal for ending the government shutdown: attaching a one-year extension of soon-to-expire Affordable Care Act subsidies to a spending stopgap that would reopen agencies.
…
“This is a reasonable offer that reopens the government, deals with health care affordability and begins a process of negotiating reforms to the ACA tax credits for the future,” Schumer said. “Now the ball is in the Republicans’ court. We need Republicans to just say, ‘Yes.”
The offer generated some quick GOP backlash, however. Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) posted on X that it would unduly benefit health insurance companies to blindly extend the subsidies: “Another year of insane profits at the expense of consumers and American taxpayers,” he wrote.
Schumer’s counteroffer came after Democrats met privately for hours Thursday to try to find a path forward that would unify the caucus. It’s a shift from the start of the shutdown, when Democrats included a permanent extension of the Obamacare subsidies in an alternative to the GOP-led continuing resolution that passed the House.
Shortly before Schumer’s speech, a group of roughly a dozen members of the Senate Democratic Caucus — including the No. 2 leader, Sen. Dick Durbin of Illinois — met in a Capitol basement office. The group included senators who have been negotiating with Republicans about a path out of the shutdown, as well as other Democratic senators viewed as potential swing votes.
A person familiar with the conversation, granted anonymity to describe the private discussion, said that “tone and approach” of the senators in the meeting “doesn’t reflect what you see on the floor.”
Archived at https://archive.is/mSNKC
Ahhh yes. The old “can we do this again, but closer to the midterm elections” play.
Ah yes, this is how it could play out.
MId term elections - Democracts take the house.
Republicans “We had to shut down the government because the Democrats won’t give us what we want.”
January 2027 rolls around.
Democracts “So when are going to get the new congress sworn in?”
Republicans “We never formally closed the previous session and since the government is shut down. We can’t do that. So, we’re just going to stay in power.”
Democracts “You can’t do that.”
Republicans “We are and we already showed you that will do it with Adelita Grijalva.”
I mean, at this point, why wouldn’t they do that? They just saw how much the party cleaned up during the election, so naturally they want to reap similar benefits ar a larger scale next year.
Oh, I mean, yeah… It’ll force actual people to go through similar stress and pain again, but think of the personal political gains!
Because they could have principles and keep the government shut down until Republicans capitulate and actually fund government services. Unfortunately, they’re Democrats and it will take many generations before they develop spines.
If they actually stick it out they can campaign on getting some real results instead of compromising on basic social safety nets.
Closer in an absolute sense, but not in a Price is Right sense. One year brings the subsidies to after the next election, when there’s no active pressure to apply. I don’t know why the Republicans didn’t jump on it immediately, this is a giant gift to them.