Johnson will not commit to standalone legislation on the House floor

For about two weeks, I have stated that I think the GOP could flip the narrative against the Democrats by putting a standalone bill on the floor to extend the tax subsidies.

If they did that for one year, I don’t believe Democrats would have accepted it, and that would have flipped the narrative.

Well, guess what? Now it is Democrats offering the one-year extension, so, of course, the GOP is rejecting it.

It Was Already Offered

The first time this was put on the table was back in the middle of October, but the GOP was not willing to offer any guarantees.

Thune said he was willing to put a standalone bill on the floor, which was rejected, and Thune responded, “At some point, Democrats have to take yes for an answer.”

This is when Democrats really dug in, feeling the public momentum swing.

They knew it would help them in elections, and they were right, but now they are really digging in.

Not Doing It

Over the last few days, there has been a lot of talk about Thune reintroducing a standalone bill, but that plan has been rejected by Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) in the House.

He stated, "Leader Thune has bent over backwards. He's offered them a vote. You know what they told him in response? ‘No, we need you to guarantee the outcome of that vote.’ Well, that's ridiculous.”

When the media pressed Johnson on committing to floor a bill if Thune could get it passed in the Senate, he shot right back, "No, because we did our job, and I'm not part of the negotiation. The House did its job on Sept. 19. I'm not promising anybody anything. I'm going to let this process play out.”

I respect his decision, but I thought it was a mistake because I think this is how the GOP could have flipped this on Democrats. Force them to vote “no” to a reasonable solution where the subsidies could then be debated and fixed.

Too Late

If I did not know better, I would think Senator Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) is reading my blog posts because he just offered up my exact recommendation.

Schumer suggested a one-year clean extension on the subsidies in exchange for reopening the government, adding, "It's clear we need to try something different." He continued, "Democrats are ready to clear the way to quickly pass a government funding bill that includes healthcare affordability. Leader Thune just needs to add a clean, one-year extension of the [Obamacare] tax credits to the CR so that we can immediately address rising healthcare costs. That's not a negotiation. It's an extension of current law, something we do all the time around here."’

While I have not seen everyone’s reaction, there were more than a few Republicans who had already rejected the idea, but Thune would only need 13 Republicans to get this passed. Then it would have to get through the House, but only if Johnson agreed to put it on the floor.

This could have been a real win for Republicans because there is no way the Democrats would have accepted this deal two weeks ago; they even openly rejected the idea of a one-year extension when it was brought up. The party is directionless right now, zero strategy, and it just cost them a huge win where they could have buried the Dems and flipped the momentum. Now, with this offer coming from the Democrats, the GOP has no way out of this., They reject the deal, and they take on the shutdown. They accept it, and they caved to Democrats. They really blew a great opportunity.