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Don't believe the headlines. The government shutdown is not about Obamacare. That's just the pretext. The shutdown is a tactic employed by the Democratic congressional leadership to create a high-profile platform from which to oppose President Donald Trump. More dangerously, it's a political trap for the GOP, aimed at influencing next year's elections. Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer and House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries are proposing that, in exchange for Democrats agreeing to re-open the government, Republicans must agree to a total of $1.5 trillion in additional health-care spending, including $900 billion to repeal Trump's Medicaid reforms and provide free health care to undocumented immigrants. Democrats also want $400 billion to extend the so-called "Biden covid credits." This is their No. 1 demand, and the reason people think the shutdown is about Obamacare. The Biden credits are additional subsidies that expand the lavishness and taxpayer cost of the existing Affordable Care Act health insurance premium tax credit program (Obamacare). Created as a pandemic response measure in 2021, with zero Republican support, the additional credits have always been temporary. They expire at the end of the year. Schumer and company now want them made permanent. If they're allowed to expire, they claim, there will be a health-care apocalypse, with exploding insurance premiums and millions of people losing coverage. Those claims are greatly exaggerated. The credits did two primary things. First, they created new "zero-dollar plans" (100 percent free insurance for individuals making less than $23,475 a year or $48,225 for a family of four). Second, they eliminated the income cap, making sliding-scale premium subsidies available to those with higher incomes. The changes doubled the size of the Obamacare population and increased its cost by $35 billion a year, every penny of which goes straight to an insurance company. The extra money has spawned mass enrollment fraud, driven up health-care prices, and greatly enriched the insurance industry. The credits should be allowed to expire. Their justification, the pandemic, is behind us. And, they're costly, inflationary, and fraud-prone. You can tell the shutdown isn't really about Obamacare because of how the two parties act. Republicans have offered to discuss ways to address any legitimate concerns about disruptions as soon as the government reopens. Democrats are saying nix to that: Extension first. If they truly want to return to work and prevent a health-care "apocalypse," they could do it today. Just vote for the Republicans' clean funding bill, which in itself is uncontroversial. Any bipartisan "compromise" extending the Biden credits is sure to disappoint and divide the Republican faithful. It would diminish Trump's political capital and stall his policy momentum, giving Democrats a political boost. A few stray Republicans are promoting the notion that retaining the credits is vital to the continued GOP control of Congress. This defies common sense. It would betray Trump's 2024 election victory, which was to end, not perpetuate, Biden's numerous policy errors. Conservatives are united in opposing an extension. No Republican has ever voted for Obamacare. Doing so now would make the party complicit in the controversial program's flaws and harms. This shutdown is a political trap set by Democrats to lure Republicans into endorsing Obamacare, and then to use that mistake to retake Congress. Dean Clancy is a senior health policy adviser at Americans for Prosperity. He wrote this for InsideSources.com.
