{"id":16751,"date":"2025-12-16T00:31:38","date_gmt":"2025-12-16T00:31:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/house-gop-moderates-signal-theyll-fall-in-line-with-johnsons-health-plan\/"},"modified":"2025-12-16T00:31:38","modified_gmt":"2025-12-16T00:31:38","slug":"house-gop-moderates-signal-theyll-fall-in-line-with-johnsons-health-plan","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/house-gop-moderates-signal-theyll-fall-in-line-with-johnsons-health-plan\/","title":{"rendered":"House GOP moderates signal they\u2019ll fall in line with Johnson\u2019s health plan"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

It\u2019s a time of choosing for a band of vulnerable House Republicans who have long warned about the expiration of key Obamacare subsidies.<\/p>\n

Speaker Mike Johnson<\/a> is barreling toward a Wednesday vote on a health care bill he and other Republican leaders are presenting as an alternative to the tax credits<\/a> that are set to expire at the end of the month. They have no plans to allow a vote before then on extending the subsidies.<\/p>\n

The early signs are that the group of GOP moderates who have voiced concern about their constituents\u2019 health care costs \u2014 not to mention their own political futures \u2014 is preparing to fall in line this week.<\/p>\n

“I haven’t seen anything objectionable yet,\u201d Rep. Brian Fitzpatrick<\/a> (R-Pa.) said Monday. \u201cFor me to vote against it, I’d have to find something objectionable. I wouldn’t vote against it in protest.”<\/p>\n

While he said it would be \u201ca huge mistake\u201d to not include an extension, Fitzpatrick said he votes \u201cfor or against legislation based on the merits of the bill.\u201d<\/p>\n

Others in the centrist Republican group said much the same privately \u2014 that they are still prepared to vote for the GOP health care bill even with their bid for an amendment vote extending the subsidies apparently doomed.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re not going to cut off our nose to spite our face,\u201d said one who, like others interviewed, was granted anonymity to comment on private discussions among the group.<\/p>\n

If that sentiment holds, it would be the latest instance of how the group of moderates has largely followed Johnson\u2019s lead in 2025 \u2014 voting in lockstep on the party\u2019s domestic policy bill despite objections over Medicaid cuts, for instance, and keeping their names off discharge petitions meant to circumvent the speaker\u2019s control of the House floor.<\/p>\n

But the Obamacare lapse represents a particularly acute test for the group at a sensitive moment \u2014 after many of them have spoken out publicly.<\/p>\n

Rep. Jen Kiggans<\/a>, a Republican in a highly competitive Virginia district, warned of the political fallout<\/a> for House Republicans in a closed-door House GOP conference meeting last week. Fitzpatrick and fellow GOP Reps. Rob Bresnahan<\/a> of Pennsylvania, Nick LaLota<\/a> and Mike Lawler<\/a> of New York and David Valadao<\/a> of California have been involved in efforts to broker an extension of the subsidies, so far to no avail.<\/p>\n

It was already virtually assured the enhanced tax credits enacted and extended by Democrats under former President Joe Biden would lapse on Jan. 1, given the Senate\u2019s failure to act last week<\/a> on a Democratic proposal<\/a> for a three-year extension.<\/p>\n

Forcing a House vote on the matter this week, however, could put additional pressure on Republican leaders to explore a solution next month that would maintain the subsidies in some form for the 20 million Americans who now use them.<\/p>\n

But the GOP moderates, most of whom hail from purple districts and are at serious risk of losing their seats in the midterms, did not find any sympathetic ears among Johnson or his top leadership allies in the final weeks.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey made their case,\u201d one senior House Republican involved in the talks said of the centrists. Their last-minute push for a floor vote wouldn\u2019t change party leaders\u2019 belief that they didn\u2019t have the votes to actually pass an extension of the subsidies, the senior Republican added \u2014 especially given divides within their conference over abortion coverage.<\/p>\n

Johnson said in a recent interview he understood the \u201cdilemma\u201d<\/a> facing some of the moderates who have since launched discharge petitions to try to force a vote on an extension. But privately Johnson\u2019s leadership circle was always skeptical that those petitions would ever garner enough support to force the speaker\u2019s hand.<\/p>\n

One big problem for the centrists: They were too late.<\/p>\n

By the time Fitzpatrick and Kiggans launched separate discharge petitions<\/a> aimed at extending the subsidies, there were not enough legislative days left to trigger a vote before the House adjourns for the year and the tax credits lapse. Notably, the Republican moderates mostly kept quiet during the entire 43-day government shutdown \u2014 and didn\u2019t publicly pressure Johnson and fellow GOP leaders to negotiate as Democrats made the expiring tax credits the centerpiece of the fight.<\/p>\n

Fitzpatrick, a co-chair of the bipartisan Problem Solvers Caucus, vowed last week to keep pushing to extend the subsidies.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey can just dig themselves into an ideological corner all day long \u2014 it\u2019s not fixing the problem,\u201d Fitzpatrick said about party leaders in an interview. \u201cWe can agree that the current construct is flawed, but that letting them expire is not acceptable.\u201d<\/p>\n

Late last week, he and other moderates pushed Johnson to allow a vote on a floor amendment<\/a> to the GOP health care bill or another outlet that would allow skeptical members an opportunity to express support for extending the subsidies.<\/p>\n

But hammering out that amendment has proven intractable, with Johnson indicating directly to the group that he was trying to make something work while others in the leadership ranks remained skeptical they could.<\/p>\n

Fitzpatrick indicated Monday he plans to propose an amendment in the Rules Committee that would be modeled off his bipartisan bill that proposed a two-year subsidy extension with an income cap and other eligibility restrictions. But as of Monday there was no agreement to allow it to come to a vote, Majority Leader Steve Scalise<\/a> said.<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t think the final decision\u2019s been made\u201d on the amendment, he told reporters.<\/p>\n

The group of moderates planned to huddle on the House floor Monday night to finalize their strategy for the Tuesday Rules meeting, according to two people granted anonymity to describe the private plans.<\/p>\n

Separately, Fitzpatrick will meet Wednesday with the Problem Solvers to discuss their next steps on health care, two other people said, and he’s invited a bipartisan group of rank-and-file senators who have also been exploring a bipartisan deal.<\/p>\n

Valadao, a senior appropriator who heads the centrist-leaning Republican Governance Group caucus, was among dozens of Republicans who lost their seats in 2018 after Republicans tried to repeal Obamacare. He declined to say in an interview Monday how he would vote on the leadership-backed health bill.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019ll see how the amendment plays out,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Rep. Richard Hudson<\/a> of North Carolina, who heads the House GOP campaign arm, said in an interview Monday he hasn\u2019t given vulnerable members any advice about how they should be talking about the expiring Obamacare subsidies in their districts.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat I\u2019ve been saying to my colleagues is that we\u2019ve all got to do a better job of talking about what we\u2019re for,\u201d Hudson said. \u201cBecause we have actual policies that would bring down premiums and make health care more affordable \u2014 we just need to be more vocal about it.\u201d<\/p>\n

Asked if he was worried about the expiring subsidies costing House Republicans the majority next year, he said, \u201cNo.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cPremiums are high \u2014 we told them they would be high if Obamacare passed,\u201d Hudson said.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

It\u2019s a time of choosing for a band of vulnerable House Republicans who have long warned about the expiration of key Obamacare subsidies. Speaker Mike Johnson is barreling toward a Wednesday vote on a health care bill he and other Republican leaders are presenting as an alternative to the tax credits that are set to […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-16751","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-congress"],"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16751","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=16751"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16751\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16751"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=16751"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=16751"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}