WASHINGTON — Four House Republicans broke with party leadership on Wednesday to join Democrats in overriding the GOP majority and forcing a vote on extending healthcare tax credits — a defection that underscores the party’s growing vulnerability on economic issues ahead of next year’s midterm elections.
The healthcare tax credits, which were central to the fight that led to the longest government shutdown in U.S. history, are set to expire at the end of the year unless Congress takes action.
Democrats, and a small but increasingly vocal group of Republicans, warned that allowing the tax credits to lapse would lead to sharp healthcare premium increases for millions of Americans, which could prove a politically perilous outcome in competitive districts.
House Republicans, including Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.), have resisted extending the tax credits, arguing instead for an alternative approach to lowering healthcare costs. But that stance on Wednesday showed that they were at odds with members who say the issue would hurt constituents.
“I’m pissed for the American people,” Rep. Mike Lawler (R-N.Y.) told reporters.
His remarks came after he joined Republican Reps. Brian Fitzpatrick, Robert Bresnahan and Ryan Mackenzie, all from Pennsylvania, in signing a Democrat-led petition that needed 218 signatures to force a floor vote on a bill to extend the healthcare subsidies for three years. The four Republicans were the final votes needed.
California Rep. Kevin Kiley (R-Rocklin), who represents a swing district, was not among the Republicans to sign the petition, but he told reporters it is important for leadership to take up the matter sooner than later. Otherwise, he said, it would be a “failure of leadership.”
“We have members on both sides who believe this is an urgent issue and it is for all of our members in terms of what their constituents are going to have to deal with at the end of the year,” Kiley said. “So, what is wrong with having a vote?”
Californians are bracing for monthly premiums on the Covered California exchange — a state portal for Obamacare coverage — to soar by 97% on average for 2026. Open enrollment for the coming year runs until Jan. 31.
Even if the subsidies remained intact, premiums for plans offered by Covered California were set to rise by roughly 10% for 2026, due to spikes in drug prices and other medical services, experts said. But a failure to address the lapsing credits is expected to result in sticker shock across the state and the country. Nearly six in 10 Americans who use the ACA marketplace live in Republican districts.
A vote on the House measure is expected in January, after the subsidies have already expired. Even if the House effort succeeds, its prospects remain dim in the Senate, where Republicans last week blocked a three-year extension.
Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.) has argued against the Democratic extension as “an attempt to disguise the real impact of Obamacare’s spiraling healthcare costs.”
On Wednesday, after the petition gained enough votes in the House, Thune told reporters the chamber will “cross that bridge when it comes to it.”
The push in the House underscored a breakdown in Johnson’s control of the chamber as well as the deep divisions among GOP lawmakers on how to address healthcare costs, which polling consistently ranks as a top concern among voters.
The small rebellion against Johnson came after tensions emerged on healthcare talks in the chamber.
Johnson had discussed allowing more politically vulnerable GOP lawmakers a chance to vote on bills that would temporarily extend the subsidies while also adding changes such as income caps for beneficiaries.
But after days of discussions, the leadership sided with the more conservative wing of the party’s conference, which has assailed the subsidies as propping up a failed marketplace through the ACA, which is widely known as Obamacare.
House Republicans pushed forward Wednesday a 100-plus-page healthcare package without the subsidies, instead focusing on long-sought GOP proposals designed to expand insurance coverage options for small businesses and the self-employed.
Fitzpatrick and Lawler tried to add a temporary extension of the subsidies to the bill, but were denied.
“Our only request was a floor vote on this compromise, so that the American People’s voice could be heard on this issue. That request was rejected. Then, at the request of House leadership I, along with my colleagues, filed multiple amendments, and testified at length to those amendments,” Fitzpatrick said. “House leadership then decided to reject every single one of these amendments.”
After the four Republicans broke with him on Wednesday, Johnson pushed back against the notion that the episode shows he is losing influence over the chamber.
“I have not lost control of the House,” Johnson said. He instead pointed to a “razor thin margin” in the chamber, which he says allows a few defectors to circumvent leadership.
“These are not normal times,” he added.
This article includes reporting from the Associated Press.
