“Hopefully they will pass a bill that gets the funding bills moving, pays the people who have been working without pay, puts the benefits back in play. There have been people who have been without pay, there have been people without benefits, this has been really a hardship on a lot of families. This has been unnecessary, and we certainly hope that they move this forward.”
The longest-ever government shutdown is a showdown between Republicans who wanted to pass a funding bill and Democrats who wanted to use the opportunity to guarantee the extension of health care subsidies under the Affordable Care Act.
The apparent deal struck between Republican lawmakers and a group of Democrats would not guarantee ACA extensions that expire Jan. 1 but promises a future vote on it.
“They shut the federal government down negotiating about things that were unrelated,” Turner said. “We need to move forward, we need to have government working and we need to have people not getting hurt.”
U.S. Rep. Greg Landsman, D-Cincinnati, issued a statement Monday opposing a deal that doesn’t include health care subsidies.
He says the deal could lead to 22 million Americans paying more for health care, including 32,000 in his district, which includes all of Warren County.
“All while the vast majority of Americans — in poll after poll — have made it clear what they want: reopen the government and extend our healthcare subsidies," Landsman said.
“I assume all of us that have been fighting to protect our constituents from soaring healthcare costs will vote against this.”
