Senate Republicans plan vote on a health care alternative as ACA funds look likely to expire

The Senate will vote on Democratic and Republican health care bills this week, but Affordable Care Act funds are still likely to expire this month.

WASHINGTON — As the U.S. careens to a health care cliff, Senate Republicans say they’ll offer a bill written by two key committee chairs as an alternative to extending billions of dollars in Affordable Care Act funds that are expiring this month.

Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., said the Senate will vote on a bill by Senate Finance Chair Mike Crapo, R-Idaho, and Senate HELP Chair Bill Cassidy, R-La., “side-by-side” to Democratic legislation that would extend the enhanced ACA funds for three years, preventing sharp premium increases.

He stopped short of promising that all 53 Republicans would back the Republican bill, but it is almost certain to fail either way, as it would take 60 votes to advance.

“Our members — and I can’t say 100%, but I think for the most part, I would argue — are united behind the Crapo-Cassidy proposal,” Thune told reporters Tuesday after a Senate Republican lunch meeting where they discussed what to do.

Thune said the bill “is about patients, not insurance companies; and about lowering premiums, not increasing them, and about getting a better return for the federal taxpayer.”