Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga., has broken with her party in the ongoing standoff over the government shutdown. In so doing, she is effectively arguing that the Democrats are right to demand that Republicans make concessions on health care policy — although she might not wish to describe it that way.
Greene shared a long post on X airing her grievances, including that “when the tax credits expire this year my own adult children’s insurance premiums for 2026 are going to DOUBLE, along with all the wonderful families and hard-working people in my district.” She further lamented, “Not a single Republican in leadership talked to us about this or has given us a plan to help Americans” with this crisis.
Democrats have pounced on Greene’s defection.
Greene is correct: an analysis published by KFF, a nonpartisan health policy research group, estimates that when enhanced subsidies expire at the end of the year, premiums for health insurance plans purchased through the Affordable Care Act marketplace are expected to more than double in 2026. And she’s right that GOP leaders have no plan to do anything about it.
That’s exactly what Democrats are trying to prevent with their firm position on the shutdown. In addition to calling for an extension of the ACA subsidies, Democrats are calling for a repeal of the Medicaid cuts in exchange for votes to pass a government funding bill. Republicans have tried to hold the line against negotiating over those issues while the government remains shut down, but Greene has created a striking gap in their ranks.
To be clear, Greene’s post also included a bunch of nonsense. She tried to create distance between herself and the Democrats by claiming that she wasn’t a fan of Obamacare to begin with because its passage allegedly made health insurance “unaffordable.” That’s false. Greene also tried to claim she was trying to create her “own lane” by arguing that she doesn’t want undocumented immigrants to have access to taxpayer-funded health care or benefits, and implied that’s what Democrats want to do. That too is false. As Georgetown University professor Leonardo Cuello has pointed out, undocumented immigrants do not have access to Medicaid and “have also never been eligible for premium tax credits to purchase Marketplace plans, and cannot even purchase a private plan on the Marketplace with their own money.”
To cap it all off, Greene included, mid-post, “Also, I think health insurance and all insurance is a scam, just be clear!” I’m not sure what to make of that statement — but to the extent that it could mean that Greene is skeptical of private health insurance, I’ll quietly give the statement one cheer. (I hope she’ll look into the only just and sensible policy solution to our disastrous system: “Medicare for All.”) Democrats have pounced on Greene’s defection. Rep. Greg Casar, D-Texas, who chairs the Congressional Progressive Caucus, boosted Greene’s statement on X, specifically amplifying Greene’s claim that “Not a single Republican in leadership… has given us a plan to help Americans deal with their health insurance premiums DOUBLING!!!” This is exactly what President Donald Trump and Republican leaders don’t want at this juncture as they try to play chicken with Democrats over the shutdown. A high-profile MAGA figure who knows how to draw attention from the media and has secured a lot of trust from the Republican base is calling out the party’s leaders as wrongheaded. And despite Greene’s oddball statements that muddy the waters on the nature of Obamacare, her overall narrative that the GOP’s leadership has no plan to avert a catastrophic surge in health care prices is correct — and the exact kind of policy development Democrats will hammer Republicans for ahead of the midterm elections. If more Republicans join Greene, it could force Trump and leaders to cave to Democratic demands in order to get the government running again.
Zeeshan Aleem is a writer and editor for MS NOW. Previously, he worked at Vox, HuffPost and Politico, and he has also been published in, among other places, The New York Times, The Atlantic, The Nation, and The Intercept. You can sign up for his free politics newsletter by clicking the link at the top of this bio. 
