Policy analysts, Democrats, and Republicans are all unhappy with the deal, agreeing that the healthcare spending cuts included are modest. The bill passed with bipartisan support in the House and is expected to pass the Senate by June 5. The bill includes some cuts and caps to healthcare spending over the next two years but exempts medical systems like Medicaid from the deep cuts approved in April by the Republican-led House of Representatives.
The compromise, negotiated primarily by House Speaker Kevin McCarthy and Biden administration officials, would suspend the debt ceiling until January 1, 2025, after the next presidential election. Most conservative Republicans are furious about what they see as a payoff for Democrats and believe that they did not receive anything in return for borrowing another $4 trillion.
The Limit, Save, and Grow Act, the first proposal by House Republicans to raise the debt ceiling, would have dramatically slowed federal spending growth and cut the federal deficit by nearly $5 trillion over the next decade. However, it was not included in the compromise.
The bill does not impose new labor requirements for Medicaid, and it freezes next year’s other healthcare spending at current levels with a 1% increase the following year. The House and Senate Appropriations Committees will decide how to allocate funds to discretionary programs that monitor spending levels. Advocacy groups argue that even a funding freeze would harm programs that provide needed services to millions of Americans, whereas conservatives hoped the debt ceiling struggle would give them a chance to extract even more federal spending.
In conclusion, while the healthcare sector is expected to have minimal impact, the compromise would amount to a political victory for Democrats who leave the main federal healthcare systems Medicare and Medicaid untouched and protect entitlement programs first. Lastly, the Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation provided permission to reprint this article from khn.org, an editorially independent news service, and a program of the Kaiser Family Foundation, a nonpartisan health policy research organization independent of Kaiser Permanente.