Congress
This House GOP centrist is plotting a new health care bill aimed at winning over Trump
A key House Republican moderate is drafting a new bill that would extend soon-to-expire Obamacare subsidies and offer a carrot to try to win over more-conservative GOP colleagues and President Donald Trump.
Rep. Brian Fitzpatrick (R-Pa.), who co-chairs the bipartisan Problem Solvers Caucus, outlined in an interview Friday several elements he is eyeing for the new proposal: an extension of the Affordable Care Act tax credits, with income limits and required minimum premium payments; new flexibility for health savings accounts, a conservative priority aimed at wooing Trump and conservatives; and potentially a stalled bipartisan package overhauling the role of pharmaceutical benefit managers.
Fitzpatrick, who has been working with fellow GOP centrists who are desperate to address the subsidy cliff, said it was “our hope” that they would soon introduce a bill encompassing those provisions.
“We’re going to have to move quickly,” he said.
The proposal would be competing with multiple alternatives from conservative Republicans who are proposing to at least partially end the federal subsidies for plans purchased on Affordable Care Act exchanges, replacing them with individual accounts that they say would give Americans more flexibility to purchase health care.
Fitzpatrick and his allies are open to moving toward more flexibility for HSAs, but they don’t want to allow the Obamacare tax credits to expire as well. Some in the group strongly believe they need to focus on extending the existing subsidies first, then develop a broader health care overhaul.
Fitzpatrick, Rep. Don Bacon (R-Neb.) and several other Republicans in the Problem Solvers group spoke about their health care plans during a private dinner Thursday night. Bacon rolled out a separate bipartisan plan Friday with GOP Rep. Jeff Hurd of Colorado and Democratic Reps. Tom Suozzi of New York and Josh Gottheimer of New Jersey that would extend the subsidies for two years, albeit with new restrictions on eligibility.
But Fitzpatrick said that, based on conversations with colleagues, more than an extension will need to be included in order to attract a critical mass of GOP votes. Trump and top House GOP leaders have signaled they are opposed to continuing the ACA tax credits, and scores of House Republicans have signaled the same.
House Majority Leader Steve Scalise, asked about the centrist Republicans’ aims in an interview Friday, said GOP leaders had other plans. He indicated Republicans are planning to bring legislation dealing with HSA flexibility, the PBM overhaul, cost-sharing reductions and other conservative policies to the floor in the coming weeks — but not an ACA tax-credit extension.
“There are a lot of really good ideas that we’re going to be bringing to the floor for votes that lower premiums for families, bring more transparency and more options for families,” he said.
When asked if GOP leaders believe it’s tenable to allow the subsidies to expire, letting those other policies fill the gap, he replied: “We don’t have all the final things agreed upon, and we will work through it with our whole conference.”
The House GOP centrists feel left in the lurch by their own leaders, who have followed the lead of more conservative factions in advocating for the subsidies to expire. But they’ve also been angered by moderate Democrats, who they say are insisting on first sketching out a larger “framework” for negotiations.
Democrats have been cool to the GOP proposals that would substitute individual spending accounts for the existing subsidies, arguing that they would not fully fill the financial gap for many Americans and could destabilize health insurance markets.
One House Republican who was at the Thursday night dinner said colleagues spent a large portion of the evening kvetching about Democrats, whom they remain angry at after the lengthy government shutdown.
“We’re past talking about frameworks,” said another House Republican, who was granted anonymity to speak candidly about the internal discussions. “This is an emergency.”
President Donald Trump and Speaker Mike Johnson will meet at the White House Tuesday with the executives of top artificial intelligence companies, according to two people granted anonymity to discuss private plans.
The meeting comes as Congress is coming under increasing pressure to put federal guardrails on AI development, as fears mount that technological advancements could soon spiral beyond human control.
Responding to some warnings that AI development was on track to cause human extinction by the end of the decade, Johnson has said he wants Trump and AI CEOs to “go in a big room, close the door and sort this out.” He has yet to endorse major legislative action to address the issue, as Trump has resisted calls for government regulations, citing concerns about lagging behind China.
The president and speaker were in attendance at the State Dinner on Thursday night in honor of Chinese President Xi Jinping’s visit to Washington, as were OpenAI CEO Sam Altman, Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang, Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg and Google CEO Sundar Pichai. It was not immediately clear which of these executives would be invited to next week’s meeting, and who will be participating.
News that the meeting had been scheduled was first reported by Axios.
A group of 10 Democrats has signed on to Rep. Greg Casar’s (D-Texas) bill that would ban superintelligence and pause advanced AI development until a vetting regime could be stood up.
Reps. Alexandria Ocasio Cortez (D-N.Y.) and Ro Khanna (D-Calif.), both of whom are mulling a 2028 presidential run, are cosponsoring the bill, named the Ban Artificial Superintelligence Act.
Khanna, in a statement, noted that he convened a hearing this week on AI safety cooperation between the U.S. and China as ranking member of the House China Select Committee with AI experts who underscored the need for a verifiable pause on superintelligence.
AI superintelligence is an as-yet hypothetical form of the advanced technology that surpasses humans’ cognitive capabilities, but exactly when AI crosses the threshold into superintelligence remains contested. The bill would subject violators to a 20-year prison sentence.
The support from prominent progressives in the Democratic caucus comes as the party is navigating how they would approach AI regulation should they retake control of one or both chambers in November.
Other cosponsors include Reps. Analilia Mejia of New Jersey, Yassamin Ansari and Adelita Grijalva of Arizona, Val Hoyle of Oregon, Stephen Lynch of Massachusetts, Chuy García of Illinois, Chris Deluzio of Pennsylvania and Nydia Velázquez of New York.
“We absolutely have to slow down and regulate the advancement of dangerous AI technologies that have the potential to spiral out-of-control and threaten humanity,” Ansari said.
To Lynch, a string of recent AI-led cyberbreaches has “shown us that the advanced forms of this are out of control,” he said in an interview. “We haven’t really solved that control problem yet, nor have we got the alignment problem right yet.”
Casar’s bill, introduced this week with Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), is among the most stringent AI regulations proposed by either party.
Rather than focusing on bans as Casar and his progressive allies have done, centrist Democrats are looking to legislative proposals they say can address the technology’s risks without stifling innovation.
Senate Republicans are discussing whether to call up a data center utility costs bill as they make plans to stay in Washington next week rather than beat an early exit before the midterms.
Two GOP aides who spoke on the condition of anonymity said the Senate will remain in town amid pressure from some corners of the party to send members home early to campaign.
Asked if the Senate will stay next week, Majority Leader John Thune said Thursday it’s “looking that way.”
While some lawmakers had hoped to move a long-brewing bipartisan energy permitting deal, those hopes have evaporated, and GOP leaders are instead eyeing votes on the Ratepayer Protection Act — a top priority of endangered Ohio Sen. Jon Husted.
Thune said Thursday moving to the data-center-focused bill next week “is an option.” The Senate is also expected to take up a Democratic resolution condemning the Iran war and several presidential nominations.
The Ratepayer Protection Act easily passed the House earlier this month, but some Senate Democrats are arguing it does not go far enough and party leaders could be motivated to deny Husted a pre-election win.
Josh Siegel contributed to this report.
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