U.S. Sen. Jon Ossoff joined his Democratic colleagues Thursday to sound the alarm that health insurance premiums for millions of Americans are expected to rise next year because Congress has chosen not to extend subsidies that kept costs low.
These subsidies, which originated in the coronavirus relief bill led by Democrats in 2021, help defray the costs of coverage purchased on the Affordable Care Act exchanges. For low-income families, coverage is often free or low-cost, but the subsidies also greatly reduced prices for middle class policyholders purchasing coverage on the exchanges, including those owning or working at small businesses.
Without congressional action, the subsidies expire at the end of this year. Republicans, who control the House, Senate and White House, chose not to include another extension in the tax-and-spending bill passed in July, which President Donald Trump called his “big, beautiful bill.”
“I am urging congressional Republicans to reverse course and to prevent this massive increase in health insurance premiums that’s coming swiftly for Georgians as a result of the Trump budget bill that was passed earlier this year,” Ossoff said during a news conference in Atlanta Thursday.
Ossoff, citing analysis from nonpartisan groups, predicted Georgians would pay 20%-40% more in ACA premiums unless Congress acts.
Although there is bipartisan support for extending the subsidies, perhaps by including language in the stopgap funding bill likely to be needed to keep federal agencies open after Sept. 30, no solid plans have taken shape.
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution previously reported that Georgians purchasing policies on the exchange are expected to see some of the biggest price increases in the nation. Preliminary analysis of companies’ rate proposals conducted by The Wall Street Journal and the health research group KFF showed that the average increase would be 21%, but it varied by company.
United Healthcare said costs for its plans in Georgia would skyrocket an average of 42%, according to KFF researchers.
Continuing the subsidies would cost the federal government roughly $30 billion per year.
Members of both parties have made the case for doing so, often citing the wide popularity of the subsidies. However, GOP leaders have not settled on a plan or even said if one is coming, and time is running out. Open enrollment begins in November.
Some Republicans say they do not want the federal government to continue to offset the cost of coverage purchased on the exchanges tied to the Affordable Care Act, also known as Obamacare.
U.S. Rep. Buddy Carter, who until recently was the chairman of a House subcommittee that oversees health policy, is running for the Republican nomination to challenge Ossoff next year. He said he has priorities other than extending the subsidies.
“Democrats had the opportunity to make Obamacare COVID credits permanent and chose not to,” Carter, R-St. Simons Island, said in a statement. “We need to address the waste, fraud and abuse in health care that’s inflating costs for our most vulnerable instead of writing blank checks to big health insurance like United, CVS and Cigna.”
A spokesman for another Republican campaigning for the seat, U.S. Rep. Mike Collins, said the focus should be on what his party did accomplish in the bill Trump signed on July 4. Provisions like expanding access to health savings accounts and others intended to reduce Medicaid fraud have the chance to expand choice without adding to the national debt, spokesman Corbin Keown said in a statement.
“Right now, many insurance companies are gouging patients, and Rep. Collins is working to hold them accountable and lower rates for Georgia families,” Keown said.
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