Maine’s Gov. Janet Mills (D) has again issued a statement urging lawmakers to extend the expanded health insurance tax credits that are set to expire at the end of this year.
This latest statement comes as open enrollment begins for plans on Maine’s health insurance marketplace, CoverME.
Known as the enhanced premium tax credit (EPTC), this program gives many Americans access to free or discounted monthly premiums if they purchase their insurance through the Affordable Care Act (ACA) marketplace.
Without intervention from Congress, this tax credit is set to expire at the end of this year. Should this happen, only the more constrained version of the tax credit originally included in the ACA will remain in effect.
Many congressional Democrats have pointed toward the ongoing debate over these expanded tax credits as the primary reason for their refusal to end the nearly record-long government shutdown by approving a continuing resolution.
Right now, about 85 percent of the roughly 61,000 Mainers who get their insurance through the ACA marketplace take advantage of the EPTC.
Absent Congressional action, the 2021 expansion of this credit — approved as part of the American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) and allowed those who otherwise would have fallen outside the income eligibility requirements to pay a discounted premium — will lapse.
Originally, Americans were only eligible for a tax credit if they earned between 100 percent and 400 percent of the federal poverty level, equal in 2025 to between $15,650 and $62,600 for a single-person household. This range increases to between $32,150 and $128,600 for a family of four.
Under the EPTC, however, anyone making above this threshold would have their monthly health insurance premium capped at 8.5 percent of their income.
The EPTC also eliminated or nearly eliminated premiums for those making between 100 percent and 150 percent of the federal poverty line.
The cap on premium contribution levels were also lowered for recipients at all income levels. According to KFF, these enhanced subsidies resulted in an extra $700 worth of savings, representing about 11 percent of the total savings provided by the tax credit and reducing the average annual net premium by about 44 percent.
In early September, about a month before the start of the ongoing government shutdown first began, Gov. Mills issued a press release urging lawmakers to extend the enhanced credit.
Many of the ideas expressed in that statement were echoed in remarks shared by the governor on Halloween this year.
In the interim, Mills has thrown her hat in the ring for one of Maine’s two seats in the United States Senate, vying for the position that has been held by Sen. Susan Collins (R) for nearly thirty years.
“Across our state, Maine people with health insurance through Maine’s ACA marketplace are seeing their premiums skyrocket for next year — and for no good reason,” she said.
“It’s frustrating to me because we all know these increases could be avoided in part if Republicans in Congress just stepped up to do the commonsense thing: extend the enhanced Federal tax credits,” Mills continued.
“To me, this is pretty straightforward: Maine people, like those across the country, want affordable health care, they want to feed our most vulnerable, and they want a government that is open and that works for them,” she said. “Republicans — who control the White House, U.S. Senate, and the U.S. House — should stop standing in the way of these basic things.”
On Monday, Collins said that today’s election might help break the impasse that has led to one of the longest federal shutdowns on record.
