WASHINGTON, DC – As nearly half of all Americans struggle  to afford groceries, utilities, housing, transportation, and healthcare, the Senate GOP voted today to worsen the acute cost-of-living crisis by failing to extend Affordable Care Act (ACA) tax credits that lower the healthcare costs for millions of working families. New data estimates roughly 6 million Americans could be forced out of the ACA marketplace because they can no longer afford their premiums, significantly more than previously expected.. 

H.R.1, Republicans’ hallmark legislation this year, cut over $1 trillion from healthcare to fund about $1 trillion in tax cuts for the ultra-rich. The new law shifts the colossal burden of healthcare costs onto middle- and working-class families already stretched thin by the affordability crisis. 22 million people on the ACA marketplace are feeling it first, as premiums skyrocket thanks to Republicans. Those who can still afford to buy coverage on the marketplace will have to pay jaw-dropping monthly premium spikes of hundreds or thousands of dollars more each month just to keep their healthcare. 1 in 4 current enrollees say they very likely will be forced to drop coverage because they can no longer afford it. 

“Republicans can’t hide from the fact that their signature bill spikes healthcare costs for working folks but hands tax breaks to billionaires,” said Adam Ruben, Director of Economic Security Project Action. “For all their recent posturing on the affordability crisis, Republicans just blew their biggest chance to show voters they’re actually doing something about it. Talk is cheap, but healthcare isn’t. Today’s vote was their last shot to shield millions of people from a terrible sticker shock on January 1st, and to try and reverse some of the alarming open enrollment drop-offs that many states are reporting. The damage is already done for millions of hardworking Americans even if a January compromise magically materializes, and proposals like Senator Crapo and Senator Cassidy’s would just make a bad problem even worse.”