Trump urges Republicans to end Obamacare, send funds straight to ‘the people’ as gov’t shutdown drags on

President Trump urged Senate Republicans Saturday to end Obamacare and send federal health care spending “directly to the people,” as the federal government shutdown stretched into its 38th day.  

“I am recommending to Senate Republicans that the Hundreds of Billions of Dollars currently being sent to money sucking Insurance Companies in order to save the bad Healthcare provided by ObamaCare, BE SENT DIRECTLY TO THE PEOPLE SO THAT THEY CAN PURCHASE THEIR OWN, MUCH BETTER, HEALTHCARE, and have money left over,” Trump wrote on his Truth Social.

“In other words, take from the BIG, BAD Insurance Companies, give it to the people, and terminate, per Dollar spent, the worst Healthcare anywhere in the World, ObamaCare,” he wrote. 

Trump weighed in on a day the Senate is holding a rare Saturday session after a deal collapsed that would have reopened at least three federal agencies while temporarily extending government funding.

Obamacare insurance subsidies are a top negotiating point of Senate Democrats, who have refused to vote for a House-passed bill to reopen the government without heading off subsidies set to balloon at the start of the year.

Democrats on Friday rejected a new Republican idea to fully fund three agencies while passing short-term temporary funding for the rest of the government.

The latest gambit by Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer was a proposal to temporarily reopen the government while extending existing government health care subsidies for a year. But Senate Republicans refused to go along with that idea, saying they will negotiate on the subsidies only after the government opens.  

Trump also called to “terminate the Filibuster!” The Senate rule requires a 60-vote supermajority for legislation including a bill to reopen and fund the government. That idea is meeting resistance from within Republicans in the Senate, who fear Democrats would use it against them if they took control.

The president’s posts come as the shutdown’s effects are becoming more acute. Americans are bracing for airport chaos and airlines are cancelling hundreds of flights amid problems scheduling air traffic controllers, who are going unpaid during the shutdown.

The government’s plan to partially fund Supplemental Nutrition Assistance SNAP payments remains snarled in the courts amid a Monday Supreme Court pause. The administrative order by Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson allows the Trump administration to temporarily withhold benefits.