WASHINGTON — Alabama’s GOP House members all supported the Republican health care legislation on Wednesday that does not extend pandemic-era health insurance subsidies, virtually guaranteeing the tax credits will expire at the end of the year.
The bill expands access to association health plans, allowing small businesses to pool resources to provide health coverage. It also imposes new transparency requirements on pharmacy benefit managers and appropriates money for cost-sharing reduction payments to help lower-income Americans pay for insurance.
“I’m supportive because I’m ready to see what we can do to reduce what the American people are paying for health insurance,” Rep. Dale Strong, R-Huntsville, told Alabama Daily News.
Reps. Barry Moore, R-Enterprise, Mike Rogers, R-Saks, Dale Strong, R-Huntsville, and Robert Aderholt, R-Haleyville, all voted for the GOP measure. Rep. Gary Palmer, R-Birmingham, did not vote, but expressed support for the bill. Democrat Reps. Terri Sewell of Birmingham and Shomari Figures of Mobile opposed it.
In Alabama, nearly 447,000 people receive tax credits to help pay for their insurance through the Affordable Care Act marketplace, according to the Kaiser Family Foundation, a health policy research group. Roughly 130,000 Alabamians could be priced out of affording coverage at all when the enhanced subsidies lapse, according to Alabama Arise.
“Based on the information we’ve got, it appears that most of those tax credits are going straight to the health insurance companies and not helping the American people,” Strong added. “So I believe we will continue to have the dialogue, but I do think that this package right here will put that money back with the American people.”
The ACA subsidies are sent directly to the insurance companies to lower premiums for enrollees.
Before the House vote on the GOP measure, four House Republicans revolted Wednesday morning and signed onto a Democratic discharge petition to force a vote on extending the ACA enhanced subsidies for three years.
But that vote is not expected in the House until January and faces an uncertain path in the Senate, which already rejected the same proposed extension. So, hundreds of thousands of Alabamians are set to see their premiums increase next month.
“The only thing worse than a clean extension with no reforms and no income caps is doing nothing and letting it expire and having a cliff with no bridge whatsoever,” Rep. Brian Fitzpatrick, R-PA, one of the four Republicans who signed the petition, told reporters.
Republican Reps. Robert Bresnahan and Ryan Mackenzie of Pennsylvania, and Mike Lawler of New York, also signed onto the discharge petition. Alabama’s two congressional Democrats supported it.
“It’s about time to do something that should have been done a long time ago,” Figures told ADN. “And I’m hopeful that the actual vote will take place soon and that we’ll be able to extend these tax credits the way we need to.”
The small group of moderates defied Speaker Mike Johnson, who said Tuesday that he would not put a vote on the House floor addressing the expiring tax credits. At the beginning of the week, the four Republicans met with Republican leadership to reach a deal that would allow them to vote on a shorter extension with modifications. But Johnson plowed ahead with the Republican-backed health care plan.
Moore said he thinks the “best idea” is not to extend the subsidies and instead move forward on the Republican plan.
“Well, I think if we move fast and put the money directly to the people… we’ll be okay,” Moore told ADN.
But no health care fix is expected to garner enough support in both chambers before lawmakers leave for the holidays at the end of this week.
Palmer blamed Democrats for implementing the Affordable Care Act and setting up the expiration of the enhanced subsidies at the end of this year. He said he’s pushing for his own health care bill, the New Health Options Act, to be considered in January when the House is expected to continue work on the issue.
Sewell said Congress should not leave Washington for the holiday recess until lawmakers vote on the ACA discharge petition.
“We should be voting on that bill,” Sewell said in a video message. “We should be voting on it today.”
Across the Capitol, the House Republican bill faces an uphill battle in the Senate, and so does the discharge petition. But some bipartisan senators met with House moderates on Wednesday to discuss a path forward. Four Senate Republicans crossed party lines last week to support the Democratic measure to extend the subsidies for three years.
Sens. Katie Britt and Tommy Tuberville, R-Ala., did not vote for the extension, but previously said they were open to modifications to the tax credits.
After the House’s discharge petition reached the necessary 218 signatures, Tuberville told Alabama Daily News he still wouldn’t support a straight three-year extension without changes.
“It’s just the way it is,” he said. “Four years ago, we didn’t have these subsidies, and… all of a sudden, we need ’em to survive after four years of being given more money,” Tuberville told ADN.
Democrats in Congress implemented the enhanced subsidies to help expand health coverage to Americans in 2021 in response to the COVID-19 pandemic.
Follow Us