Centrist Lawmakers Expect House to Vote on Health Subsidies

The top Republican on the centrist House Problem Solvers Caucus says it’s inevitable the chamber will vote on legislation to deal with the looming expiration of Affordable Care Act tax credits.

“We will get it to the floor” by the end of the year, Rep. Brian Fitzpatrick (R-Pa.) said at a Bloomberg Government event. The health-care subsidies were a major holdup throughout the 43-day government shutdown that ended last week, with most Democrats refusing to vote for funding legislation without an extension.

Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.) guaranteed a floor vote on extending the subsidies in his chamber, but Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) refused to make the same promise—leaving Democrats afraid any legislation will languish in the House without becoming law.

“I can’t see any scenario that something navigates a 60-vote threshold in the Senate on such a critically important and time-sensitive topic, like health, that just dies on the vine,” Fitzpatrick said. “We’re not going to let that happen.”

Fitzpatrick said he and lawmakers including Sens. Jeanne Shaheen (D-N.H.) and Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska) are in contact, including a text group chat, about which legislation could pass both chambers.

Rep. Tom Suozzi (D-N.Y.), who leads the centrist Problem Solvers Caucus with Fitzpatrick, said lawmakers may need to start a discharge petition to force a vote on an extension of the ACA subsidies. The maneuver allows rank-and-file lawmakers run around leadership and force floor votes with 218 signatures. Discharge petitions were rarely used before the last Congress but have become more common given narrow majorities in the House.

“To get something in the House may require the threat or an actual discharge petition,” Suozzi said. “People are not going to say publicly at this time that they’re going to do a discharge petition, they’re not going to go against the leadership at this stage of the game on this issue.”

Johnson and other GOP leaders have discouraged Republicans from joining discharge petitions, calling them a tool of the minority.

The issue with a discharge petition, Suozzi added, is timing. Such an effort needs to ripen for multiple legislative days, which are limited before the end of the year.