WASHINGTON — A key architect of one of the GOP’s proposals to replace the now-expired enhanced Obamacare subsidies lamented that progress has stalled due to a lack of consensus among Republican lawmakers.
Rep. Aaron Bean (R-Fla.) is hoping to help inspire Republicans to get healthcare reform talks back on track by convening discussions and debates among healthcare policy nerds he’s dubbed the “Path to Consensus Series.”
“We’ve got a bunch [of ideas]. We got a handful of things, but there is no consensus on where we go,” Bean told The Post about the GOP’s efforts to address the enhanced Obamacare subsidies issue.
“My crystal ball says Obamacare is here to stay,” he added, while caveating that he believes the program is deeply flawed. “We know it’s not affordable, sustainable, or in the long-term interest of individuals because it doesn’t give us the best results.”
Last year, Bean teamed up with Rep. August Pfluger (R-Texas) to roll out the More Affordable Care (MACA) Act, which would take federal healthcare subsidies and funnel them into “Trump Health Freedom Accounts” for Americans to spend as they wish, except on abortion or gender transition procedures.
Around that time, there were multiple competing proposals, including measures that would’ve only transferred funding from the enhanced Obamacare subsidies.
But Republicans were split over the details and weren’t able to come up with something that could clear the 60-vote filibuster threshold in the Senate, which would require Democratic support.
Democrats leveraged last year’s record-setting 43-day government shutdown to pressure Republicans into extending the enhanced Obamacare Premium Tax Credits — which cost about $30 billion annually — and were implemented in the Inflation Reduction Act that passed in 2022. They were only in effect for three years.
That pressure campaign failed to garner any significant concessions from Republicans, but it did elevate the healthcare issue and prompt the GOP to brainstorm reform ideas.
Bean believes the ingredients to a successful healthcare reform plan “are going to be a choice” for consumers.
“Consumers have got to have a say in what they’re purchasing and what they’re doing, and there’s got to be competition. Without those two things, we’re going to get crap,” said Bean, which he argued is what Americans are getting now.
“We’ll have sticker shock whether you’re on Obamacare or not … everybody’s gone up on almost everything.”
Bean held part one of his “Path to Consensus Series” last year to debate the enhanced Obamacare subsidies specifically, describing it as a “heavyweight slugfest.”
Last Thursday, he convened part two for a spirited conversation on two niche healthcare policy issues: the 340B Drug Pricing Program requires and site-neutrality. He organized the dialogue without a strong position on either issue.
The 340B program requires certain pharmaceutical manufacturers to give discounts to hospitals and healthcare providers that care for a disproportionate amount of people who can’t afford to pay for their treatments. Critics argue that those hospitals often mark up and sell those drugs for profit.
Site-neutrality is where Medicare would pay the same rate for a given service regardless of where it is performed, rather than having different rates between hospitals and doctors’ offices. Some estimates say it could save $157 billion over a decade, but critics argue it could be a financial disaster for hospitals.
“Let’s flesh out good ideas. Let’s flesh out things as we build a consensus on a health care system that we can afford,” he said.
While talks on healthcare have stalled, GOP leadership is eyeing the Senate reconciliation process, the legislative avenue it pursued last year to pass the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, to get some form of healthcare reform done.
But that effort has faced headwinds, with the tax-writing House Ways and Means Committee Chair Jason Smith (R-Mo.) telling reporters last year, “I don’t see a path of a second reconciliation ever passing.”
Additionally, Republicans would have to find consensus on healthcare policy, which has so far proven elusive.
“I would love to do a reconciliation part two. You literally got to thread the needle,” Bean said, referring to the House GOP’s threadbare majority. “You can lose one [Republican]. If you lose two, it fails. So the bar is extremely, extremely high.”
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