Today In Republicans Being Useless: House GOPers Surrender On Obamacare Fight
Shawn Fleetwood Visit on Twitter @ShawnFleetwood
By every measure, the GOP is more useless than that raccoon that broke into an ABC store, got drunk, and passed out on the bathroom floor.
After successfully holding strong in the face of a Democrat-led government shutdown over Obamacare, a cabal of House Republicans is now waiving the white flag on the issue.
On Thursday, nearly three dozen Democrats and Republicans introduced a proposal to extend taxpayer-funded Obamacare subsidies. As Federalist Senior Contributor Christopher Jacobs has regularly reported in these pages, these Biden-era subsidies — which are set to expire at the end of this year — have been a complete and total disaster.
Spearheaded by Reps. Josh Gottheimer, D-N.J., and Jen Kiggins, R-Va., the measure “would extend and reduce the tax credits in a two-step process, requiring two separate votes by Congress,” according to The New York Times. While the first vote “would extend the tax credits for a year with some modifications, including the addition of a new income limit,” the second vote “would implement what the group described as ‘more significant reforms,’ including potentially eliminating $0 premiums, with exceptions for need-based support.”
During a press conference introducing the proposal, Democrat-turned-Republican Jeff Van Drew laid out his best case for forcing taxpayers to keep bankrolling this broken system. The New Jersey congressman’s explanation as a self-declared “conservative” was (naturally) unconvincing.
“I do not like the Affordable Care Act. … And it’s fraught with all kinds of problems, there’s a lot of corruption … But that’s not the point today, and that’s not the discussion for today,” Van Drew said. These subsidies haven’t “been good. But ladies and gentlemen, we have a responsibility. … So, I believe that we have two responsibilities. One, to have a bridge for the American people … that would allow them to keep their health insurance. I think the second responsibility we have is to do much, much better with health care.”
In just 28 days, the ACA subsidies expire.
The tax credits need to be reformed, no question about that.
But we need to extend them now so Americans stay covered while we work on a real fix to this broken system. pic.twitter.com/xhZ9yuGBBK
— Congressman Jeff Van Drew (@Congressman_JVD) December 4, 2025