It’s not just Democrats:
I think by now that everyone understands that they might find themselves in a situation where they might need to buy health insurance for themselves. Lose a job, move someplace and often if you start a new job you have to wait for a few months before you qualify for the employer health care and you need a stop gap. (A lot of those people might qualify for Medicaid too so they ought to be concerned about that as well.)
The ACA is now an intrinsic part of the American health care system and it relies on government support. I think people understand that and they don’t want it messed with.
Unfortunately, most people don’t know that the Republicans feel the subsidies should go up because they really enjoy making people suffer:
It’s on Democrats to get the word out because the last the the Republicans want is for more people to know about it. That is the logic of the shut down. They are trying to break through the noise. And it’s working. The WSJ reported yesterday:
President Trump has projected unwavering confidence that he is winning the messaging war over the government shutdown. But behind the scenes, his team is increasingly concerned that the issue at the center of the debate will create political vulnerabilities for Republicans.
Advisers are worried that the GOP will take the blame for allowing healthcare subsidies to expire, raising costs for millions of Americans ahead of next year’s midterm elections, according to administration officials.
Inside the White House, aides are discussing proposals to extend the enhanced subsidies for Affordable Care Act health-insurance plans, the officials said. Trump hasn’t yet decided whether he will endorse such a proposal, according to the officials. Republicans say they will only hold negotiations with Democrats on the matter after the government is reopened.
Yeah, that’s not going to work guys. You are liars and cheats and your word isn’t worth the toilet paper its printed on. Pass the extensions, then talk about re-opening. And we’ll be needing to see Russ Vought put on a chain because he’s made it clear that any funding the Congress makes is just a suggestion.
Update — Oh my, this is interesting:
Paragon Health Institute was established in 2021 and has only 11 full-time staffers, but founder Brian Blase is credited with formulating many of the proposals that became the basis for nearly $1 trillion in Medicaid cuts enacted as part of the GOP megabill. The group’s success is thanks in large part to its vast alumni network spread out across the highest levels of government, from the speaker’s office to the Trump administration.
Now Blase is looking to exert his clout again, mounting a fierce campaign to convince lawmakers to let enhanced Affordable Care Act tax credits expire at the end of the year. Democrats have made an extension of the boosted Obamacare subsidies, first approved by Congress in 2021, as their centerpiece demand in the current government funding fight. Republicans need to figure out if they’re willing to deal — and Paragon doesn’t want them to bend at all.
“Brian is exceptionally smart, principled, and motivated by good intentions,” said Paul Winfree, the president and CEO of the Economic Policy Innovation Center — another conservative think tank — who served as a top economic official in the first Trump White House. “He truly wants to solve problems in health policy and believes — I think correctly — that the government is the cause of many of them.”
But Paragon is making a key segment of congressional Republicans uncomfortable, according to interviews with a dozen House GOP lawmakers, senior aides, White House officials and people close to the administration, many of whom were granted anonymity to provide their candid views or describe private conversations.
Though conservatives are largely complimentary of the think tank, a swath of House Republicans, including some of the conference’s most vulnerable incumbents, privately say Paragon is dead-set on notching conservative policy wins irrespective of the damage they might do to the GOP’s fragile majority in the midterms.
Hmmm. Maybe the Democrats knew something the rest of us didn’t? Big, if true.