By Siobhan Hughes
WASHINGTON -- Centrist dealmaker Sen. Jeanne Shaheen (D., N.H.) is trying to achieve one big final bipartisan victory: saving enhanced Affordable Care Act subsidies that she helped devise. It won't be easy.
Shaheen, who isn't running for re-election next year, spent this fall trying to negotiate a temporary extension with rank-and-file Republicans, as President Trump and Republicans faced off with Democratic leaders during the government shutdown. No deal emerged, but Shaheen and allies did win one big concession: a vote in the Senate on a to-be-determined Democratic-written healthcare proposal next month.
Now, a core group of lawmakers -- from both parties and both chambers of Congress -- that includes Shaheen is in discussions about devising a short-term extension of expiring ACA subsidies, paired with changes to tighten eligibility sought by some Republicans, and hoping the package gets a shot on the floor.
"It's in everyone's interest to get this done," Shaheen said Tuesday on Fox News, where she warned that it would be "shortsighted" of Republicans to fail to act. Shaheen spoke on the network Trump is known to watch before making the same point later on CNN, which has a Democratic-leaning audience.
Shaheen's effort to find a compromise comes at a tough time for centrists. Many Republicans want nothing to do with extending ACA subsidies, which flow to more than 20 million Americans, calling them an expensive Band-Aid on exploding healthcare costs. Meanwhile, some Democrats are taking their own hard line and promising to punish Republicans in the 2026 midterms if they don't bend.
"The center has been diminishing for a while," Shaheen said after the shutdown ended. "This is an effort to get it back."
When news reports emerged about a plan being floated by the White House to extend subsidies by two years, Shaheen quickly issued a statement applauding the step toward talks. Trump later walked back the proposal but signaled he remained open to a deal.
"Some kind of extension might be necessary to get something done," Trump said Tuesday night.
It has been a rough stretch for Shaheen, who has a reputation for being loath to occupy the starring role in negotiations and has shied away from discussing details of talks. After she voted with a handful of other Democrats earlier this month to back a GOP bill to end the government shutdown, she was criticized by her own party for what was cast as a surrender.
Shaheen's daughter, who is running for Congress as a Democrat, said she disagreed with her mother. On cable TV's The Daily Show, Jon Stewart said Shaheen had used the needs of her constituents as "cover for her cowardice." She was heckled at an event in her state.
Democrats who joined Shaheen to end the shutdown are also involved in discussions with Republicans now. "It's not an organized group; they're asking us for our views and we're talking to them about theirs," said Sen. Tim Kaine (D., Va.).
Republicans in touch with Shaheen include Sens. Lisa Murkowski (R., Alaska) and Susan Collins (R., Maine). The three formed the core of a group of self-described "Wonder Women" who helped pass President Joe Biden's bipartisan infrastructure law.
"You've got to keep working," Murkowski said last week.
Democrats passed the ACA in 2010 and first expanded the subsidies in 2021 to people at every income level during the Covid-19 pandemic, with no Republican support either time. But with many voters in red states set to see the premiums they pay increase sharply if enhanced subsidies expire next year -- a number of Republican lawmakers are eager to find some sort of extension to fend off voter anger in the midterms.
"You could argue whether or not the subsidies should have ever been passed, but they are what they are," said Sen. Thom Tillis (R., N.C.). "People are reliant on them."
The federal health assistance is deeply intertwined with Shaheen's own career. She joined a 2017 effort to increase the subsidies and led a similar push in 2019 that was the model for the extra ACA subsidies enacted during the pandemic. Those enhancements, in turn, were reminiscent of the children's health-insurance support she delivered as New Hampshire's governor in the 1990s.
Shaheen has already laid the groundwork for concessions in any ACA deal.
During the shutdown, she traded ideas with GOP lawmakers, saying that an income cap of $200,000 for receiving the enhanced subsidies was reasonable. She also opened the door to requiring everybody to pay at least something toward premiums -- an idea Republicans support as a way to head off fraud but Democrats see as a deterrent to obtaining healthcare.
While Shaheen has been trying to find a middle ground, party leaders and activists have been pulling in the other direction. Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D., N.Y.), initially insisted on a permanent extension of the ACA subsidies -- a nonstarter for GOP lawmakers -- in exchange for voting to end the shutdown.
As the impasse dragged on, Schumer whittled down the Democratic Party's demands to a single year of additional subsidies. Republicans rejected that plan too. Shaheen and a handful of other Democrats then broke with Schumer to vote to reopen the government, with the promise of a healthcare vote by mid-December.
Open enrollment for next year's ACA plans started Nov. 1 and concludes in mid-December, raising the urgency for lawmakers. Heading into the vote, Schumer has been in regular contact with Shaheen, according to a person familiar with the matter.
Rep. Brian Fitzpatrick (R., Pa.), the top Republican on the bipartisan Problem Solvers Caucus, has also been talking with Shaheen. He said Republicans in his group are working on a plan to extend subsidies by two years and impose income caps -- but one that would also include the establishment of health savings accounts, a separate idea being pushed by some GOP senators.
He said Senate centrists are discussing an income cap of 5-to-7 1/2 -times the poverty line -- the equivalent of at least $160,750 for a family of four.
"We have to do something before the end of the year," said Fitzpatrick, who aims to release a plan after Thanksgiving.
Sen. Bernie Sanders (I., Vt.), who caucuses with Democrats, is circulating a proposal to not only extend the enhanced subsidies, but also to reverse Trump's Medicaid cuts and expand Medicare to cover dental and vision care.
Shaheen said she isn't holding any grudges against colleagues. "We need to put the shutdown behind us; end the circular firing squad," she told CBS. She joked at a recent event in New Hampshire that her daughter is still invited to Thanksgiving dinner.
Write to Siobhan Hughes at Siobhan.hughes@wsj.com
(END) Dow Jones Newswires
November 27, 2025 05:00 ET (10:00 GMT)
Copyright (c) 2025 Dow Jones & Company, Inc.
Comments