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After rejecting a G.O.P.-written plan to keep federal funding flowing, Democrats released a counteroffer that would add more than $1 trillion in health spending.
Sept. 17, 2025, 8:03 p.m. ET
Congressional Democrats on Wednesday proposed adding well over $1 trillion for Medicaid and other health programs to a stopgap spending plan needed to fund the government past Sept. 30, laying out steep demands in a showdown with Republicans that is threatening a shutdown within weeks.
Democrats put forward a bill that would fund the government through Oct. 31 and permanently extend Obamacare subsidies that are set to expire at the end of the year. It would reverse cuts to Medicaid and other health programs enacted this year as part of Republicans’ marquee tax and spending cut legislation.
The measure would also restrict the Trump administration’s ability to unilaterally claw back funding Congress previously approved, a power that President Trump has repeatedly invoked.
And it would provide far more funding to strengthen security measures for government officials than House Republicans initially proposed — $326 million in total, compared to a $30-million boost sought by the G.O.P.
The proposal only deepens the impasse that is paving the way for a shutdown at the end of the month. It emerged the day after Democrats announced their opposition to Republicans’ plan to fund the government, which would largely extend spending at current levels through Nov. 21. The Democratic plan amounted to a term sheet for what it would take to win their votes and avert a shutdown, but its contents included proposals that the G.O.P. has already ruled out.
In order for any funding bill to move forward in the Senate, where 60 votes are needed for major legislation to advance, it must win at least some bipartisan support. Democratic leaders on Tuesday said they would not provide the votes to move forward with Republicans’ plan because the G.O.P. had not negotiated with them or offered concessions.
Extending the expiring Obamacare subsidies permanently is projected to cost more than $300 billion over a decade. Reversing the Medicaid and other health cuts would restore about $1 trillion slashed in the domestic policy law.
“The contrast between the Republican proposal and what Democrats have put forward is glaring,” Senator Chuck Schumer of New York, the Democratic leader, said. “Republicans want the same old status quo of rising costs and declining health care. Democrats are fighting back with a real plan that addresses the needs of the American people.”
Top Republican leaders have said they would not entertain either extending the subsidies or rolling back the Medicaid cuts, which were a crucial source of revenue to fund the tax cuts in their domestic policy law, as part of a temporary spending package.
Senator John Thune, Republican of South Dakota and the majority leader, said his party had deliberately not included anything other than a spending extension in their stopgap plan, “to ensure that there can be no possible reason for Democrats to object to funding the government.”
He added: “We’re not looking at a vehicle for new Republican policies; we are looking at nothing more than a continuation of the status quo when it comes to funding the government.”
Unless Congress acts to extend the health care tax credits created by Democrats during the pandemic before they expire on Dec. 30, around four million people are projected to lose coverage starting next year, and prices would go up for around 20 million more. Some Republicans, particularly those facing tough re-election races next year, have expressed openness to extending them.
The Congressional Budget office has projected that 11.8 million more Americans would become uninsured by 2034 as a result of the Medicaid cuts included in the tax law.
In addition to curtailing the White House’s ability to freeze federal funds that Congress already approved, the legislation Democrats proposed would effectively undo the cancellation of spending the administration has already advanced. It would restore federal money for public television and radio stations that Republicans voted earlier this year to rescind.
The Trump administration in August notified lawmakers that it planned to cancel $4.9 billion in foreign aid, waiting so late in the fiscal year to make the request that lawmakers do not have time to reject it before the funding expires.
Margot Sanger-Katz contributed reporting.
Catie Edmondson covers Congress for The Times.
