Congress
The Medicare tweak Republicans are eyeing for their megabill is actually bipartisan
A Medicare proposal some Republicans want to include in their sweeping megabill has the backing of a key Democratic senator — though he doesn’t want it included in the party-line package.
Sen. Jeff Merkley of Oregon said in a statement that he stands behind the No UPCODE Act, a bill co-sponsored with Louisiana Republican Bill Cassiidy that tackles tools Medicare Advantage plans use to get higher payments from the federal government — calling it “common sense” that health insurers “shouldn’t be allowed to overcharge taxpayers for the care they deliver.”
However, he said in the statement to Blue Light News, the legislation should instead be considered “through regular order, not in the context of a partisan bill that will end up leaving 16 million people without health care.”
Still, Merkley’s statement standing up for the policy Republicans are now eyeing for their domestic policy agenda could give the GOP cover as they look to find more savings to offset costly tax cuts and other provisions. Including No UPCODE could generate more than $100 billion in savings and help Senate Republicans soften some politically tricky provisions in the House-passed megabill.
The House debated adding the bill to their version of the package but eventually relented after Republicans in battleground districts repeatedly warned it was too politically toxic. Now GOP senators say President Donald Trump — who had repeatedly pledged to keep Medicare intact — has privately blessed changes to the program so long as they are limited to addressing “waste, fraud and abuse.”
Even so, the discussion continues to cause heartburn in the GOP, with Sen. Josh Hawley of Missouri expressing outright opposition and a group of House moderates feeling blind-sided by the Senate discussions.
Key centrist Rep. Brian Fitzpatrick (R-Pa.) said he’d need to talk to Senate leadership about the scope of the proposal. “We specifically kept that out,” he said.
Speaker Mike Johnson demurred Friday when asked by Blue Light News if he would advise Senate Republicans to avoid touching Medicare, saying we “haven’t addressed that yet.”
It’s not yet clear to what extent Democrats will seek to weaponize any GOP attempts to target Medicare in their “big, beautiful bill” — and it could be tricky if the underlying policy Republicans embrace is bipartisan. So far the opposition messaging has focused largely on potential cuts to Medicaid, the joint federal-state health program for needy Americans.
Already, though, the possibility of adding the Cassidy-Merkley legislation to the megabill has generated fierce pushback from the insurance industry.
Mary Beth Donahue, president and CEO of advocacy group Better Medicare Alliance that counts insurers among its members, said in a statement Friday that the legislation amounts to a cut to benefits and would “break a promise to millions of seniors who rely on it.”
Cassidy said in a statement the legislation would help cut down on fraud and waste in Medicare Advantage, which lets older Americans get a private plan with additional benefits.
“To say the No UPCODE Act has bipartisan support is an understatement,” he said.
Jordain Carney contributed to this report.
Rep. Suzanne Bonamici (D-Ore.) is jumping into the race to lead House education committee Democrats.
The Oregon Democrat officially declared she will run to be the top Democrat on the House Education and Workforce Committee in a Dear Colleague letter sent to members of the Democratic caucus Tuesday and shared with Blue Light News.
Bonamici’s jump into the race marks another challenger for Rep. Bobby Scott (D-Va.), the panel’s current ranking member. Rep. Jahana Hayes (D-Conn.) is also running for the panel’s top spot.
Bonamici wrote in the letter that she is “ready to bring a fresh and collaborative approach to invigorate this Committee with a plan to champion the education and labor priorities of our Caucus. With my legal background, I’m prepared to use all of the power of Congress to hold Trump and his cronies, including Secretary Linda McMahon, accountable for the harm they have caused.”
Bonamici introduced a resolution to impeach the Education secretary because of McMahon’s efforts to dismantle the department without the approval of Congress.
Tuesday’s announcement comes after Bonamici told POLITICO last month that she was not ruling out a run for committee leadership and was having conversations about it. Her leadership run now comes as Democrats believe they will win the House majority in November.
The Oregon Democrat, who currently serves as top Democrat on the K-12 subcommittee, said the whole panel “must provide a bold and visionary approach while fighting Trump’s corruption and assault on public education, unions, and working families” if they take the majority.
BETHLEHEM, Pennsylvania — Speaker Mike Johnson defended President Donald Trump’s use of taxpayer funded political-themed ads ahead of the election, but he said it was “good” that MAGA Inc. would pay for them going forward.
Johnson said Tuesday that he’s only seen one of the Trump ads and that it “looked like a public service announcement.”
“It was talking about America’s greatness and the economy coming back, and it wasn’t a plea to vote for anybody. It was just — it was pro Americana,” Johnson told Blue Light News during a campaign stop in Pennsylvania.
But he added: “If the Super PAC’s funding them, that’s good.”
Trump said Monday that he or his aligned super PAC would pay for the series of taxpayer-funded ads featuring him in the final few weeks of the midterms. His decision came after bipartisan backlash, including from some GOP candidates like Brinker Harding in Nebraska’s 2nd District publicly broke with the president and said they shouldn’t be paid for with taxpayer money.
Still, asked if Trump should refund taxpayers the money already spent on the ads, Johnson demurred. He said previous Democratic administrations have run PSAs as well, though Democrats argue these ads violate federal laws against using taxpayer money for “publicity or propaganda purposes.”
“Look, they’re making their decisions on funding campaigns and the content of all of it,” Johnson said of the president’s team.
“I’m going to tell you the president is deeply vested,” Johnson added, noting Trump was out on the campaign trail for Republicans.
Johnson spoke alongside Rep. Ryan Mackenzie (R-Pa.) during a law enforcement event in the perennial bellwether of Pennsylvania’s 7th District. He called Mackenzie’s race one of the “top three in the country” and warned it would be “enormously expensive.”
He later argued that Democrats, if they win the House majority, would roll back GOP work on the economy and “empower our enemies around the world at the worst possible time.”
“That would roil the markets … if Democrats turned Congress into lawfare on steroids,” Johnson said.
Pennsylvania is the first of seven states that Johnson plans to visit this week as he continues his midterm campaign blitz.
Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito said he plans to stay on the court through next year, brushing aside speculation that he could retire early and let President Donald Trump fill his seat after the election but before a new Congress is sworn in next year.
“I intend to stick around through this term,” Alito, 76, said in an interview with Bloomberg News. “I made that decision many months ago.”
The Supreme Court began its new term on Monday, which will last through next June.
Alito, the second-oldest justice on the bench, was in the news last week after telling CBS News that he considered retiring this year and will do so again in 2027.
His comments come as the fight over control of the Senate is in a dead heat. Democrats would have to flip at least four seats, but recent polls show several races, including in states Trump carried easily two years ago, remain competitive.
Several Senate Democratic candidates are already running on the prospect of filling a seat on the Supreme Court or, at least, denying Trump’s ability to do so. Senate Republicans successfully blocked a Democratic nominee in 2016, allowing Trump to fill the seat after he came into the White House.
“Our race to decide Ohio’s next Senator could not only determine control of the U.S. Senate, but also who fills a lifetime seat on the highest court in the land,” Sherrod Brown, the Democratic nominee in Ohio, wrote in a blog post Monday. “Ohio’s next senator could be our first line of defense against another partisan Supreme Court Justice — or rubber stamp a Trump nominee.”
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