Two Republicans may break a deadly promise

The longest government shutdown in American history ended less than two weeks ago, but the battle over Affordable Care Act credits and Americans’ health-care access still rages in Congress. Approximately 100,000 Virginians could lose their health insurance if the credits lapse, lawmakers and advocates say.

Virginia’s Democratic congressional delegation has staunchly supported extending the credits, which help people buy health insurance via the ACA marketplace and are set to expire at the end of December. Now, it’s time for Virginia’s Republican U.S. Reps. Rob Wittman and Jen Kiggans to make good on promises they made before the shutdown and during it.

Specifically, Wittman, who represents Virginia’s 1st Congressional District, and Kiggans, who represents Virginia’s 2nd District, should prove they did not lie when they pledged to protect their constituents’ access to Medicaid and affordable health care.

Virginia’s other GOP representatives also should support access to Medicaid and affordable health care by extending the insurance subsidies. Sadly, they all lacked the courage to sign pledges promising to do so.

Ahead of the shutdown, Wittman and Kiggans signed letters to the Speaker of the House and the President of the Senate saying they would not vote for a budget with cuts in Medicaid, which pays medical bills for the poor and disabled.

Wittman and Kiggans also questioned the wisdom of their Republican party’s plan to let federal subsidies that made health insurance affordable for millions of low-income, working-class, and middle-class families expire at the end of the year.

But then, they both voted for Trump’s “Big Beautiful Bill” that cut Medicaid and let insurance subsidies expire. In doing so, Wittman and Kiggans set the stage for millions of Americans — including tens of thousands in their districts — to lose access to health care and face financial ruin from medical debt.

So, like their GOP peers, Wittman and Kiggans betrayed their constituents who likely will suffer untreated illnesses or crushing doctor bills in the current budget. Their “no” votes could have defeated the current budget bill.

Senate Democrats felt so strongly about this that they refused to pass the budget without affordable health-care measures. And so, the shutdown began.

Wittman, particularly, spent the shutdown talking about how he voted for a “clean budget” that would have kept the government running temporarily, but which Democrats blocked over health-care issues. Wittman implied that the temporary budget left time for negotiating those issues.

Kiggans was among a bipartisan group of House members who offered a bill in September to extend health insurance subsidies for a year to allow more time to negotiate a more permanent extension or put in replacement health insurance subsidies.

Republican House Speaker Mike Johnson never brought that bill to the floor for a vote. Instead, he adjourned the House when the shutdown started, so no new legislation could be offered.

U.S. Sen. Tim Kaine of Virginia was among seven Democrats and one independent who broke ranks with their party’s leadership to reach a compromise deal to reopen the government. The Senate compromise included a guarantee of a vote on extending health insurance subsidies by mid-December in the upper chamber. Johnson still has not agreed to allow that vote in his chamber.

At this point, it is up to Republican representatives like Wittman and Kiggans, who promised to support access to affordable health care and Medicaid, to live up to that promise. They must do whatever they can to enable and support a vote that extends health insurance subsidies before those subsidies expire.

If Wittman and Kiggans still lack the courage to do that, they will have betrayed their constituents for a second time.

• Virginia native Jim Spencer is a former Minnesota Star Tribune Washington correspondent, metro columnist for the Denver Post and the Newport News Daily Press, feature writer for the Chicago Tribune, editorial page editor for the Charlottesville Daily Progress, and reporter for the Norfolk Virginian-Pilot. He lives in Williamsburg where he started his 50-year journalism career doing a little bit of everything with the Virginia Gazette.