House Democratic leader Hakeem Jeffries is challenging House Speaker Mike Johnson to a prime-time debate on the government shutdown and what he calls “the Republican health care crisis.”
“A debate on the House floor will provide the American people with the transparency they deserve,” Mr. Jeffries of New York wrote in a letter Monday to Mr. Johnson, Louisiana Republican. “It will also give you an opportunity to explain your my way or the highway approach to shutting the government down, when Democratic votes are needed to resolve the impasse that exists.”
Mr. Jeffries said he’s prepared to hold the debate “any day this week in primetime, broadcast live to the American people.”
Mr. Johnson declined the invitation, dismissing it as “theatrics” and part of Democrats’ “desperate pleas for attention.”
“We don’t need to waste time on that nonsense,” he said.
The government shutdown entered its sixth day on Monday.
SEE ALSO: Shutdown set to drag into sixth day with no signs of a breakthrough in Congress
Mr. Johnson and other Republicans have said the only way out is for the Senate to clear the House-passed stopgap reupping the prior fiscal year’s funding levels and policies through Nov. 21.
“My friend Hakeem had his shot,” the speaker said. “We debated all this on the House floor, as you know, before we passed our bill. He spoke for seven or eight minutes.”
Democrats “argued and they stomped their feet and screamed at us and all that,” he said. “And still, we passed the bill in bipartisan fashion and sent it over to the Senate. The House has done its job.”
Only one Democrat, Maine Rep. Jared Golden, voted for the GOP stopgap, while two Republicans, Reps. Thomas Massie of Kentucky and Victoria Spartz of Indiana, voted against it.
All but three Senate Democrats are blocking the House bill because they want a bipartisan negotiation on the health care priorities, in particular an extension of a COVID-era expansion of Obamacare premium subsidies that are set to expire this year. They’ve also proposed rolling back the Medicaid funding cuts Republicans enacted in the “One Big Beautiful Bill.”
“Republicans have set in motion a healthcare crisis that has ended Medicaid as we know it and ripped coverage away from millions of working-class Americans,” Mr. Jeffries said in his letter to the speaker. “Throughout the country — including in your home state of Louisiana — hospitals, nursing homes and community-based health centers are closing.”
“Equally troublesome, if the Affordable Care Act tax credits are allowed to expire, millions more will lose their healthcare coverage,” he said. “The cost of premiums, co-pays and deductibles will skyrocket in an environment where Republican policies continue to make life too expensive.”
r. Johnson said Congress has time to act on the Obamacare subsidies since the pandemic expansion does not expire until Dec. 31, adding that Democrats shouldn’t be holding government funding hostage over that.
“There’s a lot of thoughtful debate and discussion that has already been going on about that, and will go on about that, but that’s a December 31 issue,” he said.
Democrats say the subsidies need to be extended before Obamacare open enrollment begins Nov. 1 to give insurers time to adjust premium rates.
Asked about that, Mr. Johnson said, “The last time I checked, it’s October 6; we have the entire month of October.”
“We’ll stay here around the clock to work through all these things, but we have to get government open again to do it.”
• Lindsey McPherson can be reached at lmcpherson@washingtontimes.com.
Please read our comment policy before commenting.