Mike Johnson’s Health Care Deal Crumbles as Obamacare Deadline Looms

House GOP moderates are breaking away from their party leader.

At least four Republican representatives—Brian Fitzpatrick, Jen Kiggans, David Valadao, and Mike Lawler—have decided to bypass House Speaker Mike Johnson altogether amid a disagreement on extensions for Affordable Care Act premium subsidies.

There are just 17 days left on the clock before the premium subsidies expire altogether. They assist individuals making upward of 400 percent of the federal poverty level. Without them, health insurance premiums for more than 20 million Americans are expected to double.

But that 17-day deadline is effectively nil. Even if the House manages to pass a package, the Senate isn’t expected to follow suit.

What’s more, Monday is the final day for people to register for ACA open enrollment—something many may be hesitant to do if they’re not sure whether the premiums will expire, sending health care costs skyrocketing.

Last week, Johnson granted Fitzpatrick and Kiggans an opportunity to vote on an amendment to extend the subsidies. But differing opinions over the amendment’s text have effectively crumbled the deal, and the cohort of moderate Republicans are expected to go their own way, Punchbowl News reported Monday.

“Fitzpatrick, Kiggans, and Reps. Mike Lawler (R-N.Y.) and David Valadao (R-Calif.) will go to the House Rules Committee Tuesday to offer their amendment, which would extend the subsidies for two years alongside income caps and anti-fraud reforms,” the digital outlet reported. “They expect it to be rejected. It’s unclear what the moderates will do after that. They’d effectively be free agents.”

Being free could put them in a position to side with Democrats, who have pitched a three-year extension to the Obamacare tax credits. The GOP representatives’ collective signatures would push the liberal party’s discharge petition over the finish line.

Without the subsidies, policy analysts expect a mass exodus from Obamacare plans altogether that could leave roughly four million Americans completely uninsured. The spike in uninsured Americans will spur a nationwide public health problem that has historically made premiums more expensive for the insured as hospitals look to recoup the lost cash.

But have no fear, Republicans have said they’ll focus on health care policy in the coming year—after millions of Americans lose their coverage.

Donald Trump has responded to the tragic death of director Rob Reiner and his wife, Michele, with an unhinged Truth Social post attacking Reiner for criticizing him in the past. 

Trump called Reiner “a tortured and struggling, but once very talented movie director and comedy star,” and made the wildly insensitive claim that the pair died due to Reiner’s “anger he caused others through his massive, unyielding, and incurable affliction with a mind crippling disease known as TRUMP DERANGEMENT SYNDROME, sometimes referred to as TDS.” 

Right now, police have not publicly confirmed any details as to the circumstances of the pair’s death, although People magazine reports that their son, Nick, killed them and is being questioned by law enforcement. Nick co-wrote the film Being Charlie with his father, who also directed it, and has spoken extensively about his struggles with drug addiction.   

All that is known right now is that Sunday afternoon, the Los Angeles Fire Department was called to provide medical aid to the Reiners’ home and found the couple dead. 

Trump has a history of undignified responses to the deaths of people who have criticized him, most notably Senator John McCain. Reiner was very popular in Hollywood and well known for his liberal activism, earning him posthumous tributes from former President Barack Obama, former Vice President Kamala Harris, California Governor Gavin Newsom, and Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass. Even MAGA-supporting actor James Woods offered his “love and respect” to Reiner in a tribute on X.

Trump is receiving a backlash on Truth Social for his remarks, with replies from his fans criticizing his insensitivity. 

Following Jimmy Kimmel’s suspension from ABC over his comments on Charlie Kirk in September, Reiner criticized Trump and FCC Chairman Brendan Carr and noted that “there’s only a couple of us that are speaking out in this hard way.” He added, “This may be the last time you ever see me.” 

This story has been updated.

Guests at the White House Christmas reception fell silent Sunday as President Donald Trump veered way off topic to deliver a cozy holiday tale about … poisonous snakes?

“Tale” is probably giving him too much credit. During his address, 79-year-old Trump turned his attention to Peru, which he said “is known to be a rather rough place in terms of physical creatures crawling around.”

“Twenty-eight thousand people die a year from a snake bite, a certain snake. It’s a viper. It’s said to be the most poisonous snake in the world,” Trump said. “But the venom rarely works, it’s so powerful, the snake. It’s said to be the most poisonous. That, the black mamba, the brown mamba, and the viper from Peru.”

Trump tried to explain that he was telling this “story” because his son Donald Jr. was sitting in the audience, but he didn’t end up telling any story at all.

“And so, he’s being read his rights and his—this is, they thought he was dead three times, three different times, they carried him out, feeding him the anti-venom, and over a period of months he was unconscious for a long time, many weeks, and he made it. I asked him, ‘How ya doing today?’ And he said, ‘Is it perfect?’” the president rambled incoherently.

Suddenly, Trump seemed to notice that he’d lost his audience.

“Look how quiet everybody is,” the president said. “You know, it’s funny when you talk about snakes and things like that, people find it interesting.”

Interesting? No. Deeply concerning? Yes.

The son of Representative Ilhan Omar was caught up in the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown in Minnesota.

In an interview with local TV station WCCO on Sunday, Omar said that federal agents pulled over her son on Saturday and demanded proof of citizenship.

“Yesterday, after he made a stop at Target, he did get pulled over by [Immigration and Customs Enforcement] agents, and once he was able to produce his passport ID, they did let him go,” Omar said, adding that her son always carries his passport. According to the Somali American congresswoman, it’s not her son’s first brush with ICE: In the past, agents entered a mosque where he and others were praying but left without incident.

After ICE had visited that mosque, she said she “had to remind him just how worried I am, because all of these areas that they are talking about are areas where he could possibly find himself in and they are racially profiling, they are looking for young men who look Somali that they think are undocumented.”

Earlier this month, President Trump launched an immigration crackdown targeting the local Somali American community in the Minneapolis-St. Paul metro area, the largest in the country. The president said he did not “want them in our country,” calling Omar and the rest of the community garbage.

On Friday, Omar sent a letter to Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem and acting ICE Director Todd Lyons accusing the government of “blatant racial profiling” and “an egregious level of unnecessary force” in Minnesota.

“It is clear to me that this surge came in direct response to Trump’s racist comments about Somali people, and about me in particular,” Omar wrote.

Kash Patel celebrated too early again.

On Sunday, the FBI director made a lengthy post boasting about the bureau’s efforts to detain a person of interest in the Brown University shooting on Saturday night that killed two and wounded nine.

“Early this morning, FBI Boston’s Safe Streets Task Force … detained a person of interest in a hotel room in Coventry, RI, based off a lead by the @ProvidenceRIPD. We have deployed local and national resources to process and reconstruct the shooting scene—providing HQ and Lab elements on scene,” Patel wrote, attaching pictures. “We set up a digital media intake portal to ingest images and video from the public related to this incident. And the FBI’s victim specialists are fully integrating with our partners to provide resources to victims and survivors of this horrific violence. This FBI will continue an all out 24/7 campaign until justice is fully served.”

Local authorities even confirmed that the person of interest was detained off of a tip obtained by Patel’s FBI.

The person of interest was released hours after Patel’s announcement.

This blunder from Patel reeks of the same overeagerness that led to this same outcome in the Charlie Kirk shooting.

In September, he drew the ire of the left and right for his premature social media post the day of the shooting, declaring that “the subject for the horrific shooting” was in custody—a claim almost immediately contradicted by local officials. Patel later backtracked, and the manhunt ensued for another 27-plus hours before the suspect, Tyler Robinson, was turned in by a family member.

“I’m grateful that Utah authorities have captured the suspect in the Charlie Kirk assassination, and think it is time for Republicans to assess whether Kash Patel is the right man to run the FBI,” right-wing culture warrior Chris Rufo posted then. “He performed terribly in the last few days, and it’s not clear whether he has the operational expertise to investigate, infiltrate, and disrupt the violent movements—of whatever ideology—that threaten the peace in the United States.”

It’s clear that these questions still apply—and that the FBI director is still more concerned with looking tough and being celebrated than he is with actually being good at his job.