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\n The Capitol is seen from the base of the Washington Monument on Tuesday, Dec. 16, 2025, in Washington.<\/p>\n
Julia Demaree Nikhinson\/AP<\/p>\n
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Julia Demaree Nikhinson\/AP<\/p>\n
Millions of Americans are facing higher health care premiums<\/a> in the new year after Congress allowed Affordable Care Act subsidies to expire. But earlier this week, a bipartisan group of senators worked to strike a compromise that could resurrect the enhanced ACA premium tax credits \u2014 potentially blunting the blow of rising monthly payments for Obamacare enrollees. <\/p>\n “There’s a number of Republican and Democratic senators who are seeing what a disaster this will be for families that they represent,” Sen. Peter Welch, D-Vt., said on Morning Edition Thursday<\/a>. “That’s the common ground here, and it’s a doable thing.” <\/p>\n Welch said he joined a bipartisan call Tuesday \u2014 first reported by Punchbowl News<\/a> \u2014 in which a handful of senators charted out a possible health care compromise. <\/p>\n “We could extend the credits for a couple of years, we could reform it,” Welch said of the call. “You could put an income cap, you could have a copay, you could have penalties on insurers who commit fraud. You actually could introduce some cost saving reductions that have bipartisan support.”<\/p>\n But according to Welch, this legislation is only doable with President Trump’s blessing. <\/p>\n “It would require that President Trump play a major role in this, because he has such influence over the Republican majority in the House and even in the Senate,” Welch said. <\/p>\n Last fall, Republicans and Democrats fought bitterly over the Obamacare subsidy extension, causing a political standoff that led to the longest government shutdown<\/a> in U.S. history. Meanwhile, Trump has remained relatively hands-off, withholding his support for any health care legislation. <\/p>\n Despite these obstacles, Welch said he believes the jump in prices that people across the country now face will break the logjam in Congress. <\/p>\n “A farmer in Vermont, their premium is going to go from $900 a month to $3,200, a month,” Welch said. “So they’re going to really face sticker shock. There’s going to be a secondary impact, because the hospitals, particularly in rural areas, are going to lose revenue.” <\/p>\n But even if the Senate advanced a compromise bill on the ACA, the House would also have to get behind it. And the lower chamber has its own bipartisan effort on an ACA subsidy extension. <\/p>\n Just before the recess began in mid-December, four House Republicans joined Democrats in signing a discharge petition<\/a> on a three-year extension of the ACA subsidies \u2014 forcing a floor vote on the bill<\/a> when the House returns.<\/p>\n![\"Pages](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/1767316213_327_.jpeg\")
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