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Leading conservative group pulls support for GOP Obamacare defectors
The conservative advocacy group Americans for Prosperity says it’s pulling support for Republicans who vote in favor of reviving the expired Obamacare subsidies, adding new strain on the GOP as it scrambles to preserve its majority in the upcoming midterm elections.
First on the group’s blacklist are the 17 House Republicans who broke from the party Thursday to join Democrats in passing legislation that would revive and extend the Obamacare subsidies for three years. While the measure is expected to die in the Senate, a bipartisan group of senators is also working on a framework that would allow for an extension of the subsidies.
In a statement to POLITICO, AFP said it was pausing current and future grassroots activity in those 17 districts, as well as advertisements in them promoting the domestic policy package that Republicans enacted in July and that is their foremost legislative achievement.
“This was a gut punch to every grassroots activist who gave up their nights and weekends to support each of these lawmakers. Trust is going to need to be rebuilt before AFP considers committing any more resources on their behalf,” an AFP spokesperson wrote in a statement referencing the Republicans who defected on Thursday’s vote.
The AFP, which has links to the wealthy industrialists Charles and David Koch, is a staunch opponent of Obamacare and spent almost $70 million supporting Republicans in the last midterm election, according to OpenSecrets, a group that tracks money in politics. According to AFP, it has spent more than $4 million to support the July legislation, the One Big Beautiful Bill Act that cut taxes and Medicaid funding, in advertisements and conducted more than 215,000 phone calls and door knocks in the districts of the 17 members who sided with Democrats since July.
The AFP’s decision to pull its support comes as interest groups on the left plan to leverage the expiration of the Obamacare subsidies and the cuts to Medicaid against Republicans in their campaigns this year. The enhanced Obamacare subsidies, which a Democratic Congress and then-President Joe Biden created in 2021, expired in December. They drove enrollment to record highs and extending them was Democrats’ demand during the record-long government shutdown last year. Democrats had set the expiration date in a 2022 law to keep costs down.
Trump has criticized insurance companies for profiting from the Obamacare subsidies and proposed sending money directly to consumers, a plan that AFP has also supported. AFP launched a six-figure ad campaign in September urging Congress to let the subsidies expire and commissioned a poll last month showing voter support for direct payments.
“President Trump has been clear: doubling down on Obamacare is the wrong direction. He’s right — and Republicans should listen. Voters did not send Republicans to Washington to expand [Obamacare], but to address the broken health care system,” the AFP wrote Thursday in response to the House vote.
Lead Art: AFP’s decision to pull its support comes as interest groups on the left plan to leverage the expiration of the Obamacare subsidies and cuts to Medicaid against Republicans in their campaigns this year. | Getty Images
