Senate Republicans have finally landed on a plan to tackle expiring Obamacare subsidies to counter Senate Democrats, but both are likely to fail in a vote set for later this week.
Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., announced Tuesday that Republicans had coalesced around a proposal from Sens. Bill Cassidy, R-La., who chairs the Senate health panel, and Mike Crapo, R-Idaho, who chairs the Senate Finance Committee, to counter Democrats’ legislation.
The Senate is set to vote on the dueling proposals on Thursday.
Cassidy and Crapo’s plan was given the thumbs up by the majority of Republicans during the conference’s closed-door meeting Tuesday afternoon, Thune said.
Their proposal, which was unveiled Monday night but has been in the works for weeks, would abandon the enhanced premium subsidies in favor of health savings accounts (HSAs), funneling the money that has gone directly to insurers through the program to consumers instead.
Thune argued that Senate Democrats’ plan, which was unveiled by Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., last week and would extend the subsidies for three years, would do little to curb the cost of healthcare in the country, and instead benefit affluent Americans and insurance companies.
