No one seems happy with the eight Senate Democrats who crossed party lines to move forward with re-opening the government Sunday. Yes, the deal ensures that the federal government will get funding until January 30th, but what other concessions were given?
Jen is joined by Colin Seeberger, Senior Adviser for Communications at CAP, to pick apart the particulars of the controversial compromise. First and foremost, Democrats do not have a formal, written agreement from Senate Majority Leader John Thune that the Senate will vote on ACA subsidies in mid-December. Even if ACA subsidies do go to vote in the Senate, why do we think Republicans—who have been ignoring the needs of their constituents all year—will suddenly have a change of heart? As Seeberger says, “count me in the skeptical camp.”
Colin Seeberger is a senior adviser for Communications at American Progress. Prior to joining American Progress, Seeberger held various roles in public affairs and directed issue advocacy campaigns at Young Invincibles, a young adult policy and advocacy nonprofit organization. He previously worked on the national public affairs team at Berlin Rosen and in the press office of Sen. Bob Casey (D-PA). Seeberger also has a background in research, working for Grindstone Research during numerous cycles.
The following transcript has been edited for formatting.
Jen Rubin
Hi, this is Jen Rubin, Editor-in-Chief of The Contrarian. I’m delighted to have with us Colin Seeberger from CAP, who’s going to take us through what this deal is, what it isn’t, where we go from here on the ACA. Colin, what is actually in the deal?
Colin Seeberger
Sure, so the deal, continues funding for the federal government through January 30th. It also includes full-year funding for three, main, pillars of the government, including military construction and, veterans affairs, the legislative branch, as well as the agriculture department. So, it is particularly important that funding for the Agriculture Department has been included through the end of the fiscal year, so that way. you know, come the end of January 30th, if the government doesn’t have a bipartisan agreement to fund the government thereafter, folks who rely on the SNAP program, who have watched this administration rip food assistance away from them as a political weapon throughout the shutdown fight, you know, should have the certainty that they need that they will be able to get the food assistance, that they rely on in the event that there is another shutdown.
Jen Rubin
Got it. Now, this doesn’t undo the big, awful bill, correct? In other words, there were some serious cuts, and changes in the SNAP program, though nothing in this deal prevents that or mitigates that. Is that correct?
Colin Seeberger
That’s correct. So, you know, there are about 4 million people, who are on the SNAP program that the big, beautiful bill puts a bullseye on their nutrition assistance in order to be able to eat. None of those folks are, saved by this continuing resolution. It continues to put their benefits at risk.
Of course, there are 14 million people whose health coverage is at risk because of the big, beautiful bill enacting a record cut to Medicaid, as well as making really devastating changes to the Affordable Care Act, including driving up premiums, doubling premiums for millions, tens of millions of Americans.
Jen Rubin
Now, explain this vote, if you can. And by the way, that’s not in the text of the bill, so presumably there’s, like, a pinky promise someplace, or it’s written on a napkin someplace, but what is the agreement on the vote? How many votes are they going to need? What is the vote? And what happens after that vote?
Colin Seeberger
You’re exactly right. This has not been prescribed in legislative text. We actually don’t know what vote, is going to end up actually getting coming up for an up or down vote in the Senate. It will be, from what we understand, a 60-vote threshold, so it won’t be just a simple majority vote. It will need to have bipartisan support in order to get through the Senate.
And yeah, we don’t know what the specific proposal is, however, we do know that, Democrats, particularly, you know, the Democrats who have been, you know, at the table, as well as the ranking member on the Senate Finance Committee, will be, playing kind of a leading role in crafting whatever the package is that ends up coming up for a vote in the second week of December.
Jen Rubin
Now, let’s say they have a vote, let’s say by some miracle, Republicans in the Senate decide, oh, it’s a bad thing to raise people’s healthcare premiums by 200% or 300%. Is there any agreement in the House to take a vote?
Colin Seeberger
Not at all. And this may shock you, I’m not a believer that suddenly we are going to see you know, members of the same party that have voted to repeal the Affordable Care Act more than 100 times over the course of the last 15 years are gonna wake up and suddenly give a damn about people having access to affordable healthcare.
Republicans knew that healthcare premiums were gonna skyrocket in 2026. Heck, they knew a whole lot of tax policies were gonna expire at the end of this year, and it’s why in their big, ugly bill, they voted to extend the tax cuts for billionaires, for, you know, people who don’t need them, businesses who don’t need them.
You know, with the top 1% getting over a trillion dollars in new tax cuts, but they didn’t lift a finger to help the tens of millions of Americans who are set to see their premiums double. So count me in the skeptical camp that we’re gonna see Senate Republicans just wake up, read the tea leaves of last week’s elections that sent a real clear message to folks all over the country that people are sick and tired of the high cost of living in this country.
Jen Rubin
Absolutely.
Colin Seeberger
They feel it when they pay the rent or their mortgage, they feel it when they pay their utility bills, and they certainly feel it when they pay for the cost of healthcare. And yet, at the same time, this will supposedly get a vote in the Senate, if you believe the pinky promises, the handshake, but it does nothing to mean that Speaker Johnson is—say this bill does pass the Senate, there’s no commitment from Speaker Johnson that this bill is going to get a vote in the House, and I think, you know, we’d all have to be pleading ignorance to think that Republicans are gonna step up to the plate and help people when they’ve been spending the entire year trying to rip healthcare away and drive up costs for everyday Americans.
Jen Rubin
There was a lot of talk, way back when, like 40 days ago, that one of the gets would be some guardrails to prevent these rescissions, because even with these appropriations bills, if Trump suddenly says, oh, I’m going to send a rescission, I don’t want to spend this money after all.
Currently, at least in the posture that the Senate Democrats have taken, and the Senate Republicans and the House Republicans have taken, is, okay, we’ll just rip up the work we just did. Did this do anything to prevent the rescissions?
Colin Seeberger
It did not, at least in the legislative text. From what we understand, there are protections in the language of the text as it relates to the reductions in force that the administration announced after the start of this shutdown. It also includes protections for any new reductions in force that the administration could have made until the end of this, continuing resolution that runs through January 30th, but no, it includes no protections on rescissions, on impoundments, limitations on the administration for how they can or cannot transfer funding from different accounts to fulfill its own priorities.
And so, yeah, I think that is gonna be, a huge topic that members are going to be looking at as government funding runs out, seemingly at the end of January, particularly, against a backdrop if Republicans fail to, do anything on healthcare, and they reveal themselves as just not credible partners in trying to serve the American people’s best interest.
Jen Rubin
Now, you mentioned the RIFs and the back pay. I seem to remember that those were required by law anyway. And in fact, people have gone to court, allies of ours have gone to court to say, you can’t fire people in the middle of a shut down. In fact, there’s an anti-deficiency at the Donald Trump sign, for goodness sakes, and you have to give people back pay. So, this essentially just says you have to do what the law required you to do anyway. Is that what they got?
Colin Seeberger
Slightly. So the law actually prescribes that, once a shutdown has begun, the government can’t initiate new plans for instituting a reduction in force. It can implement a reduction in force that had been pre-planned prior to a government shutdown. However, what this bill would include is that there are no reductions in force that the administration is allowed to initiate in for the remainder of, this temporary government funding bill. Which, if we’re looking for any silver linings here, you know, a very modest, silver lining in that there are limitations on the reductions in force the administration can put in place through January 30th.
Jen Rubin
And the back pay for both the furloughed workers as well as the essential workers who are working without pay. That has been required by law, and this just says you gotta follow the law. Is that fair?
Colin Seeberger
That’s correct. Whether that ends up happening, who knows? We’ve seen this administration, they don’t really seem to, care about following the law, but that is, that is what the, the language kind of recertifies as, what statute, dictates.
Jen Rubin
Got it. Now, let’s come back, and finish on this, which is the ACA, which is kind of where this started. Understanding, by the way, that at the beginning of the shutdown, Democrats also said they were going to attack the enormous, cuts on Medicaid, and that kind of went by the wayside as things went along. But let’s just talk about the ACA right now.
By the time this vote comes around in December, virtually everyone will have gotten their notice of what their healthcare, is going to cost, and their premiums are going to cost, what their plans are going to cost for next year. Does that provide any additional sway, any additional arguments for Democrats, understanding that Republicans probably don’t give a damn anyway? At least there will be a understanding amongst the voters that they are being screwed, and this is literally the price of getting screwed.
Colin Seeberger
Yeah, I mean, I think that’s exactly right. This, this vote that is coming up in the Senate is, I think gonna make it painstakingly clear to the American people about, you know, who supports lowering their healthcare costs, and you know, who’s not willing to lift a finger to do anything about it?
We know that 24 million Americans are staring down huge premium increases next year. We also know, you know, it’s gonna be interesting timing here. Folks are supposed to pay their January premiums in the middle of December, right around the time that this vote is supposed to be coming up in the Senate. So, you know, I think if you are Dan Sullivan, if you are John Husted, or if you are Susan Collins, anybody who’s supposed to go to your voters next year and say, I’m fighting for you, how you can do that, with a straight face at the same time that you are really punishing people?
We’re talking about, in some cases, there are, you know, couples out there who are seeing their healthcare costs go from a few thousand dollars a year to $25,000, $26,000 a year. It’s crazy. And to think that, you know, they’re going to be able to go home and defend these votes is ludicrous. So, you know, I think the pressure is going to continue to build as we get to the middle of December.
You know, whether that is going to have any sort of impact on members, I am skeptical, especially, you know, when we saw the huge public outcry from the public against these SNAP cuts in the big ugly bill, or the historic Medicaid cuts in the big, ugly bill, and they didn’t care at all. All they cared about was following Donald Trump’s order. So, I think unless the president gets involved and sees this as, you know, what he admitted last week, as this has been a huge disaster for the party politically. I think unless he gets involved, And says ‘Okay, you guys should cut some sort of deal here,’ I don’t see a lot of Republicans signing on board to actually help people out.
Jen Rubin
Well, Colin, thank you so much for all you do, and all the clarity you bring to this. We rely on CAP, as our contrarians know, for the nitty-gritty details, which are essential, so people know exactly what is happening. So, as this, pans out, I’m sure we will have you and your friends at CAP back again. Thanks so much for joining us.
Colin Seeberger
Happy to do it. Thanks, Jen.
