{"database": "press", "table": "releases", "rows": [["https://www.blumenthal.senate.gov/newsroom/press/release/senator-blumenthal-week-in-review-10/31/2025-11/7/2025", "Senator Blumenthal: Week in Review 10/31/2025-11/7/2025", "2025-11-07", "2025", "2025-11", "Democrat", "Senate", "CT", "Richard Blumenthal", "B001277", "www.blumenthal.senate.gov", "blumenthal", "https://www.blumenthal.senate.gov/newsroom/press", "scraper", "Sounding the Alarm on the Republican Health Care Crisis\n\n[WASHINGTON, DC] \u2013 U.S. Senator Richard Blumenthal (D-CT) led fellow Democratic Senators in speaking on the Senate Floor about the health care crisis facing millions of Americans due to Republicans\u2019 refusal to extend enhanced premium tax credits for Affordable Care Act (ACA) plans. With open enrollment now underway, the Senators underscored how higher premiums will impact Americans across Red and Blue states and called out President Trump and Republicans for blocking Democratic efforts to lower costs for families.\n\n\u201cA 60-year-old couple living in Raleigh, making $85,000 a year, currently pays $89 for the least expensive plan. Without these credits, they\u2019re going to be paying $1,893 per month. Same plan, same coverage, nothing better, just more money that is charged to people,\u201d said Blumenthal. \u201cRepublicans know that these increases are going to crush hardworking Americans. It is ludicrous to expect any American enrolled in one of these plans to have the disposable income to keep their coverage. This is not a partisan issue. I can\u2019t say it often enough. This is about ensuring that every American \u2013 regardless of their zip code or their income level or their partisan affiliation \u2013 has access to health insurance coverage they need to guarantee they can live healthy and productive lives.\u201d\n\n\u201cRepublicans are choosing to make Connecticut families, Indiana families, North Carolina families, and families across the country pay more for their healthcare. So, I implore my Republican colleagues to listen to their own constituents who are telling them, we can't afford these unconscionable, exorbitant health insurance increases. Give us the means to live with the assurance that we will have healthcare insurance to take care of our kids and our families. Do the right thing for the American people. Come to the table and reinstate these credits because we are going to stand strong and stand firm on this side of the aisle, and we are the bulwark against a wave of premium increases that will surely deluge America economically and morally. We will do everything we can to stop it,\u201d concluded Blumenthal.\n\nThe full video of the Senators\u2019 remarks on the Senate Floor can be found here.\n\nBlumenthal further called out Republicans for their refusal to protect Americans\u2019 affordable access to health care on Twitter/X.\n\n\u201cAmerica\u2019s health care crisis is deepening because Republicans are reveling in the shutdown rather than making health insurance affordable. Skyrocketing premiums are breaking family budgets,\u201d wrote Blumenthal with an accompanying video on Twitter/X.\n\nSlamming Republican Efforts to Dismantle ACA Protections\n\nBlumenthal joined five Americans from across the country in demanding Congress take action to extend the ACA enhanced tax credits. The virtual press conference highlighted how millions of Americans are facing higher health care costs due to Republicans\u2019 refusal to extend enhanced premium tax credits for ACA plans. Blumenthal and the five speakers shed light on the importance of the ACA and the enhanced premium tax credits in providing affordable access to care and protecting Americans\u2019 health.\n\n\u201cIt is an assault on the Affordable Care Act. Nothing less than a blatant, clear attempt to destroy the Affordable Care Act\u2014at a moment when Americans are going to the exchanges, open enrollment has started, and they are making decisions about whether they can afford health care insurance. And what they are seeing is premiums spiking. Those premiums are doubling, tripling, because Republicans are blocking an agreement to extend the health care tax credits or subsidies that are necessary for them to afford insurance. And that\u2019s the reason that Republicans have shut down the government\u2014they\u2019re unwilling to reach that agreement that we have insisted be part of the stopgap funding bill now before us,\u201d said Blumenthal.\n\n\u201cRenewing the Enhanced Premium Tax Credit (EPTC) will empower people like me to take charge of our health, to continue working and running businesses and care for ourselves and loved ones. I am calling on all of you to support the ACA and renew the EPTC to help cancer survivors like me stay healthy and alive. Nobody should have to choose between financial devastation or death,\u201d said Victoria Sylvester of Traverse City, Michigan.\n\n\u201cWe are in a health care crisis. Since Donald Trump and the Congressional Republicans have taken power, they have put on a full blown assault on health care, and unless they stop their scheme to rip away tax credits from working families, over 20 million Americans will lose their coverage, and they\u2019ll log into the ACA marketplace and find that their health plans are more than twice as expensive as they were last year. Over 4 million will lose coverage because these skyrocketing prices are simply unaffordable, and why? To hand tax breaks to billionaires and corporations and that\u2019s just obscene,\u201d said DonnaMaria Woodson of Charlotte, North Carolina.\n\nA full video of this week\u2019s press conference is available here.\n\nBlumenthal\u2019s press conference came ahead of a hearing held by Republicans on the U.S. Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations which further sought to undermine and dismantle the ACA. At the hearing, Blumenthal, Ranking Member of the U.S. Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, slammed efforts to roll back patient protections established by the ACA and block the extension of enhanced premium tax credits for ACA plans.\n\n\u201cThis hearing is part of an increasingly isolated and abhorrent movement within the Republican party itself to continue the effort to repeal affordable health care,\u201d Blumenthal said. \u201cAs a parent of four children, now a grandparent, I think often of the people who have approached me and told me they sleep better because they know that their children down the hall from them will have access to health care if they break a bone the next day in school or if they come down with some life-threatening illness or face a potentially lethal diagnosis, and they need treatment and care, and the emotional impact and physical trials are bad enough. But fortunately, they have coverage that means they are spared from financial ruin.\u201d\n\n\u201cHealth care costs in this country are way too high, no matter what kind of coverage you have. And we should work to bring down the cost of health care, whether it is pharmaceutical drugs or hospital charges, there are many things we could do to fix those problems. But forcing Americans who rely on the ACA to pay more, especially in this economy, will not help.\u201d\n\nAt the hearing, Blumenthal invited testimony from Shana Verstegen, a small business employee from Madison, Wisconsin who currently receives health care coverage through the marketplace established by the ACA.\n\n\u201cI\u2019m here today as a proud user of the Affordable Care Act and the health care marketplace. Like so many other working families, I don\u2019t know what my family would do without it. My husband and I both work in the fitness industry as trainers and fitness instructors at a wonderful small gym in Madison. We love our jobs and work very hard helping others on a daily basis. We have been employed there since high school\u2014so almost 30 years,\u201d Verstegen said.\n\nIn her testimony, Verstegen discussed how she became an advocate within the Huntington\u2019s disease community after her mother was diagnosed with, and later passed way from, the disease. In an exchange with U.S. Senator Ron Johnson (R-WI), Chairman of PSI, Verstegen called attention to how the ACA helps individuals with pre-existing conditions, such as Huntington\u2019s disease, access affordable health insurance, \u201cI do know that the Affordable Care Act is the only option for coverage for my family. It\u2019s the only option for coverage for Huntington\u2019s disease families, for entrepreneurs. And I would really hope that lawmakers would work together to help reign in this corporate spending to help bring that down, and quite honestly, yes, the premiums are going up but so is my gas, so is my electricity, so are my grocery prices. And I don\u2019t feel like the answer to this is to increase our premiums more. I know you said this is Democrat sponsored, but Republicans and everybody have the power to pass this extended premium tax credit, so our bills don\u2019t go up even more. I\u2019m not here to fix this today, but please help us for 2026.\u201d\n\nAfter Johnson suggested that the ACA\u2019s coverage for pre-existing conditions has driven up premium prices for people like Verstegen and suggested that people with pre-existing conditions should instead be put in a \u201chigh-risk pool,\u201d Verstegen said, \u201cRespectfully, Senator, if I had tested positive for Huntington\u2019s disease, what would my option have been then? I wouldn\u2019t have had an option.\u201d\n\nThe video of Blumenthal opening remarks is available here. A video of Verstegen\u2019s testimony and her exchange with Johnson is available here.\n\nBlumenthal further slammed Republican efforts to dismantle the ACA on Twitter/X.\n\n\u201cOur contentious hearing today dramatically showed Republicans real agenda\u2014abolishing the ACA. They exploited myths & misinformation claiming that the ACA is hurting people in their continuing campaign to subvert health care insurance.This relentless campaign, dating to 15 years ago when the ACA was passed, seems to be an unstoppable obsession. It is broader & bigger than the health care tax credits. Republicans seek to tear down & demolish affordable health care insurance just as Trump destroyed the White House East Wing. It\u2019s cruel, & it\u2019s stupid,\u201d wrote Blumenthal on Twitter/X.\n\nFighting to Protect SNAP Benefits\n\nBlumenthal spoke on the Senate Floor slamming the lapse in regularly appropriated funding for the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) and calling for protections to SNAP benefits for the millions of Americans who rely on the program.\n\n\u201cWe've been clear again, and again, and again as Democrats. Americans should never have to choose between food and health, between food and rent, between food and mortgage payments, between food and electricity. There should be no need for families to choose because there should be no choice by our public officials to make them choose. But that's what we're seeing right now,\u201d said Blumenthal. \u201cAnd if we can be sure of one thing here, kids will go to bed hungry because I've talked to their moms and dads. Kids will go to bed hungry, or they will be unable to go to a doctor because Republicans say, \u2018well, reopen the government, and then we'll talk about health care insurance coverage.\u2019 We should be talking about it right now because families are making decisions about whether they can afford health insurance right now on the open markets that are ongoing right now. And they can't afford to get sick on Donald Trump's timetable. Nobody can.\u201d\n\n\u201cAs of Saturday, the regularly appropriated funding for SNAP ended, which left families across the country wondering how they're going to put food on the table, and that was when the courts stepped into this crisis. And, to state the obvious, there's no reason for anyone to go hungry, not just because the courts have ordered that SNAP benefits be provided, but because there is a moral imperative in America,\u201d continued Blumenthal.\n\nA video of Blumenthal\u2019s remarks can be found here.\n\nOn Twitter/X, Blumenthal further slammed President Trump for defying court orders calling on the Trump Administration to continue providing benefits under SNAP during the government shutdown.\n\n\u201cOnce again the court is unequivocal, the Trump Admin must stop playing politics with hunger & deliver SNAP benefits\u2014now.Continuing to deny SNAP benefits\u2014including to 1.2 million veterans\u2014would be a moral abomination, & clear illegality after the court order today. The Administration should be held in contempt if it stalls or obstructs,\u201d wrote Blumenthal on Twitter/X.\n\nHighlighting the Harm of the Republican Health Care Crisis on Veterans\n\nAt a Senate Veterans\u2019 Affairs Committee hearing, Ranking Member Blumenthal underscored how veterans will be harmed by the health care crisis facing millions of Americans due to Republicans\u2019 refusal to extend enhanced premium tax credits for ACA plans.\n\n\u201cOur veterans are suffering, just as Americans are, from looking at the exchanges and the premium on open enrollment, as we speak right now, at their kitchen tables, trying to figure out how they are going to afford health insurance. And they can\u2019t do it because premiums are doubling and tripling. Where are these veterans going to go?,\u201d pressed Blumenthal. \u201cIf eligible, they\u2019ll go to VA. And we\u2019ll see a dramatically increased reliance on VA health care, stretching the capacities of our docs, our nurses, our VA facilities generally, which are already suffering from cuts and furloughs unnecessarily imposed by this Administration\u2026cuts that have already eroded the Department\u2019s ability to support the needs of veterans. And according to the Department\u2019s actuarial firm: For every one percent of increased reliance on VA health care, VA can expect its costs to increase by $2.6 billion.1 percent. $2.6 billion. They don\u2019t have the money.\u201d\n\nBlumenthal also slammed President Trump for withholding funding for SNAP benefits\u2014emphasizing the harmful impact this is having on veterans: \u201cAnd the Administration, rather than curbing costs for the average American worker, including veterans, is prioritizing historic cuts, and I mean unprecedented cuts, in SNAP, Medicaid, and health care coverage. Americans often don\u2019t appreciate that veterans use these programs and depend on them. More than 1.2 million veteran households use SNAP, yet this Administration refuses to fully fund the program despite orders from courts that they do so. There\u2019s no equivalent service like SNAP through VA or any other federal program to serve as a safety net, meaning these cuts have devastating impacts on veterans and their families.\u201d\n\nA video of Blumenthal\u2019s remarks is available here.\n\nBlumenthal further called out his Republican colleagues for their fueling of the health care crisis impacting veterans across the country on Twitter/X.\n\n\u201cVeterans use SNAP, Medicaid, ACA premium tax credits\u2014all programs being cut & stripped of funding to devastating effect. Republicans need to stop fueling this health care & hunger crisis & work to ensure veterans have access to these critical services,\u201d wrote Blumenthal with an accompanying video on Twitter/X.\n\nBlumenthal Bulletin\n\nBlumenthal spoke on the Senate Floor in support of Senate Democrats\u2019 proposal to end the Republican shutdown and address healthcare affordability.\n\nBlumenthal demanded answers from secret donors to Trump\u2019s White House Ballroom Project.\n\nBlumenthal spearheaded a bill requiring transparency in the PACT Act toxic exposure presumptive decision process for veterans.\n\nBlumenthal pushed for transparency on secretive ICE air operations and reports of improper treatment of detainees.\n\nBlumenthal visited West Hartford students working to support food pantries amid President Trump\u2019s SNAP shutdown.\n\n-30-", 1, "2026-03-30T01:40:41Z", "2026-04-06T19:52:45Z"]], "columns": ["url", "title", "date", "year", "month", "party", "chamber", "state", "member_name", "bioguide_id", "domain", "scraper", "source", "date_source", "text", "has_text", "collected_at", "updated_at"], "primary_keys": ["url"], "primary_key_values": ["https://www.blumenthal.senate.gov/newsroom/press/release/senator-blumenthal-week-in-review-10/31/2025-11/7/2025"], "units": {}, "query_ms": 2.1611670963466167, "source": "dwillis/congress-press", "source_url": "https://github.com/dwillis/congress-press", "license": "MIT", "license_url": "https://github.com/dwillis/congress-press/blob/main/LICENSE"}