A majority of Republican voters, including Donald Trump loyalists, want enhanced subsidies under the Affordable Care Act to be renewed, a key sticking point in the government shutdown, according to a new poll.
In total, 59 percent of Republicans and 57 percent of self-identified MAGA voters want to keep the Obamacare subsidies set, which are to expire at the end of the year unless Congress strikes a deal, the nationwide survey found.
The fight over the subsidies has helped push the government into its first shutdown in six years.
Democrats say they will not support a continuing resolution to temporarily fund and reopen the government unless the GOP agrees to renew the subsidies for low-income health insurance. They are also demanding that Trump’s proposed Medicaid cuts, outlined in his “big beautiful” spending bill, be scrapped.
Trump, who has long vowed to repeal Obamacare, has so far been reluctant to back renewing the healthcare plans. He has also repeatedly pushed the false claim that Democrats forced the shutdown because they want to give free healthcare to immigrants in the country illegally.
Overall, 78 percent of U.S. adults say Congress should extend the enhanced Obamacare subsidies, which were first implemented under former President Joe Biden’s American Rescue Plan and later in his Inflation Reduction Act of 2022. The study, by the nonpartisan Kaiser Family Foundation (KFF), questioned 1,334 adults.
“We get a very clear message that the majority of the public, regardless of their partisanship, regardless of their insurance, support Congress extending these tax credits,” Ashley Kirzinger, KFF’s director of survey methodology, told NBC News.
“It’s really hard to take a benefit away after it’s been given to people.”
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If the subsidies expire, KFF analysis estimates that more than 22 million people could see their premiums jump from $888 a year to $1,904. The survey found that if that happens, about four in 10 people with an ACA plan would drop their coverage altogether.
“That’s going to result in a large number of individuals losing health coverage and becoming uninsured,” Kirzinger said. “When people don’t have health coverage, not being able to go to the doctor, not being able to get primary care, it can result in all kinds of detrimental health outcomes.”
Despite Trump and the GOP’s attempts to blame Democrats for the shutdown, the survey found that 39 percent of those who support renewing the subsidies said they would blame Trump if they expire, compared to 37 percent who would blame Republicans in Congress. Just 22 percent said Democrats would deserve the blame.
The White House has continued linking the shutdown to non-existent Democratic demands for immigrants.
White House spokesman Kush Desai told the Daily Beast, “President Trump and the administration have been clear. We will not have policy discussions while Democrats hold countless Americans hostage and demand free health care for illegal aliens. Democrats must reopen the government if they want to have meaningful policy debate.”
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