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With 70 percent of grant funding for community health centers (CHCs) set to expire at the end of the month, Republicans continue their attempts to repeal the Affordable Care Act (ACA) with the catastrophic Graham-Cassidy proposal, threatening the health care of millions of Americans.
The Senate is racing toward a vote next week on Cassidy-Graham—a bill that impacts the health care of millions of people and one-sixth of the economy—without a full Congressional Budget Office (CBO) score, an unprecedented move that defies regular order. A complete score would likely show that the bill would kick millions of people off of their health insurance and raise premiums for working Americans.
Governors across the country oppose Senate Republicans’ latest efforts to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act. Citing concerns ranging from gutting Medicaid, lack of transparency, stripping health care away from millions, passing costs onto states, and severe funding cuts, Governors have serious concerns about the potential impact of Graham-Cassidy on their states and constituents.
Republicans’ last-ditch effort to repeal the Affordable Care Act (ACA), the Cassidy-Graham bill, repeals ACA tax credits that help working Americans afford health insurance. This year, nearly 9 million Americans are receiving an average monthly tax credit of $371, amounting to nearly $4,500 in annual savings. Alaskans stand to lose even more, at $11,700 per year. In eliminating the guarantee of these tax credits, Cassidy-Graham dramatically increases premiums for 84 percent of people on the individual market and threatens to place health coverage out of reach for millions of Americans.
As the Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC), the Federal Reserve’s policy setting arm, meets this week to discuss whether to change the federal funds rate, one new issue it will be considering is the impact of hurricanes Harvey and Irma on near-term economic growth.
Without adequate public funding for quality early learning and care programs, costs of quality private programs remain out of reach for many working families or relegate their kids to lower quality care. JEC research shows that in families earning less than $100,000, children are 27 percent less likely to be enrolled in high-quality early learning. Universal access to public pre-K is key to meeting the needs of working families and setting all kids on the path to success.
Since the U.S. Senate, the American people, and stakeholders across the health care industry rejected Republicans’ efforts to repeal the Affordable Care Act (ACA), bipartisan discussions are showing promise towards solutions to stabilize the health insurance marketplaces and lower health care costs for all Americans. We are now moving forward towards a compromise proposal under regular order. Yet, the Cassidy-Graham-Heller-Johnson bill undermines this bipartisan progress and threatens to send us backwards by simply repeating the failed ideas of the former TrumpCare bills.
Analysts left and right agree: killing Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, or DACA, will cost the U.S. economy a quarter to a half trillion dollars over the next decade and stick taxpayers with a bill for creating a significant and draconian deportation force. See how DACA repeal will impact your state’s economy.
As Congress heads into a busy September, it must reauthorize funding for the Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP) by the end of the month. Currently, CHIP provides health care to 8.9 million children, or 12 percent of all children nationally. In particular, children in rural areas depend on public insurance: 47 percent are on Medicaid or CHIP, compared to 38 percent of children in urban areas.
The Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program currently allows nearly 800,000 undocumented individuals to work and live in the United States. President Trump’s decision to end the program not only flies in the face of what the United States stands for, but kicks out important contributors to the economy, undermining recent economic progress.