During an appearance on Fox Business' Claman Countdown, Senator Ruben Gallego (D-AZ) discussed the ongoing government shutdown, admitting that "it does suck," while emphasizing that healthcare negotiations need to happen.
"This does suck, and I am sorry that we are actually putting you in this situation," Sen. Gallego began, addressing constituents. "And in the short term, we are going to pay you back. We are going to make sure that everybody gets back pay. But in the long term, if we do not fix this healthcare situation, not just for people that are on the ACA [Affordable Care Act] insurance, premiums are just going to double for 22 million people, for sure, overnight."
Sen. Gallego noted that room for compromise existed, acknowledging that Democrats would not get everything they want in a divided government, "but the Republicans and Democrats have one thing in common: We do not want to raise costs right now." "Things are so damn expensive right now," the Democrat Senator expressed, adding that "the last thing we should do is raise taxes on insurance premiums right now when we know that there is a solution to this."
Host Liz Claman noted that the ACA tax credits were enhanced in 2021 during the COVID-19 pandemic and expanded to cover people who did not benefit from them, asking the Arizona Senator why Democrats still want to keep the subsidies.
"That is a very good point, and I actually agree with you, and I agree with my colleagues, that we actually do need to reform the ACA tax credit system, that there are people who maybe do not deserve these tax credits," Gallego responded. "I am all for actually negotiating that," emphasizing again that Democrats will need to compromise.
In contrast, Representative Juan Ciscomani (R-AZ) recently shared a similar argument, calling on Republicans to offer a solution to the healthcare issue. In a letter, Ciscomani wrote that "Democrats created this healthcare cliff and now want to use the shutdown to force Republicans to bail them out of their own mess, on their own terms."
