The worst of Washington politics is in plain sight as Republicans and Democrats fight over Obamacare subsidies that expire at midnight on New Year’s Eve.
It cannot be said too forcefully that the subsidies are extra money Congress heaped on top of permanent subsidies to meet the COVID emergency.
This was perhaps appropriate when the economic hardship of COVID was a real concern. But it was hard to stomach more redistribution from taxpayer pockets when the “emergency” subsidies were renewed in 2022. At that time, everyone knew the danger was over. Even then-President Joe Biden, the last holdout, finally admitted it a few months later.
So the subsidies long ago abandoned their raison d’être and have been unjustifiable for years. And even if one sets that aside, it needs to be remembered by all that the Democrats demanding they be renewed are the same people who put them in place, claiming they were temporary. It was they who set the expiration for this year.
Now they insist they be made permanent. If Washington can’t cut temporary emergency spending years after the emergency ends, can it ever cut anything? Not if Democrats have their way.
But it’s not only Democrats. A few Republicans are also to blame. The Obamacare subsidy debate reveals not only Democratic dishonesty and fiscal incontinence but also cynicism from Republicans who sacrifice principle because they fear losing their jobs.
Four Republicans from swing districts vulnerable to a blue wave in next year’s midterm elections, Rep. Mike Lawler (R-NY) and three Pennsylvanians, Reps. Ryan McKenzie, Rob Bresnahan, and Brian Fitzpatrick, abandoned their party and their leader, Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA), and handed the Democrats victory with a one-vote majority in favor of forcing a House vote for a three-year extension of emergency subsidies with no reforms attached.
Adopting a pose of principled indignation, Lawler told the Wall Street Journal, “I’m pissed for the American people. This is absolute bulls***,” and invoked Congress members’ “responsibility to serve their district, to serve their constituents.”
He’s right about the “absolute bulls***.” Members are not ambassadors doing whatever voters demand at any given time. They’re supposed to be what their title, “representative,” says they are and what Edmund Burke explained two centuries ago. A representative’s job is to lead, to make good policy decisions, not to hide behind the excuse of following voters’ orders.
Instead, to avoid slipping down the greasy pole of politics and landing with a bump, the four Republicans crossed the aisle and handed an unprincipled victory to the Democrats. They say this is intended to put pressure on leaders to hammer out a compromise. But it is unlikely to do that and certain to boost Democratic morale and prompt Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY) to think he has the majority party on the run.
It’s not as though the three-year extension without reforms will become law, for the GOP majority in the Senate will reject it. The rebels might therefore think they’ve done no harm, registered a protest, but not made bad policy. But they’ve thrown their party into disarray and shown voters that the other side can get bipartisan votes for legislation. If there is bipartisan support for Obamacare, doesn’t that tell voters that the centerpiece of Democratic policy of the past 20 years is a success, not a failure?
That message will hardly help Republicans in next November’s elections.
