$4.1 Billion
Continued analysis of the impact of federal budget proposals on state coffers raises alarms about the proposed elimination of the Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program (LIHEAP), which offers assistance to more than 6 million low-income households to afford heating and cooling. Payments under the program typically go directly to utility companies.
Temperatures reaching record highs in many parts of the country this week underscore the need for energy assistance programs as a matter of public health. Low-income households typically have higher energy burdens in their homes due to poor insulation, drafts, or an inability to afford repairs to areas like windows and doors. LIHEAP supports low-income households with members especially vulnerable to extreme weather conditions. In fiscal 2023, the program reached 2.1 million households where a resident had a disability; nearly 1 million households with small children; and 2.4 million households which included an elderly person. In places like Maricopa County, Arizona, extreme heat has been deadly, with nearly 600 people dying from heat-related conditions in 2024 in that county alone.
Research from the United States Department of Agriculture’s Economic Research Service draws a clear line between energy assistance and food security. When faced with difficult financial decisions, families often choose between keeping the air conditioning on and purchasing enough food. Failure to maintain adequate support for LIHEAP could have dire consequences for well-being in low-income families, especially those with children.
In Nebraska, more than 43,000 households received assistance under LIHEAP in Fiscal Year 2022, the most recent year for which data was available. Of those, 77% included a vulnerable family member. The majority of the assistance, about 82%, went to assistance for heating and cooling during extreme cold and heat.
Particularly in light of the historic cuts Congress is considering to food assistance and health care in the reconciliation process, eliminating LIHEAP in the president’s proposed budget would be especially deadly.
21.4 Million
New estimates from Wakely Consulting, a healthcare actuarial firm which analyzed several proposed changes to state insurance Marketplace enrollment provisions outlined in the reconciliation package currently under consideration in the Senate, estimated that between 11.2 and 13.6 million Americans would lose coverage under the Affordable Care Act (ACA) should pending legislation pass as written. Combined with the 7.8 million Americans the Congressional Budget Office estimates will lose Medicaid coverage due to more stringent work requirements with medical exemptions that are more difficult to prove, up to 21.4 million Americans would lose health coverage. To put this number in perspective, that’s about the population of Nebraska and every one of its neighboring states combined, according to Census data.
Wakely analyzed several provisions in aggregate, including expiration of premium tax credits, ending ACA marketplace coverage for Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals Recipients, shortening the open enrollment period, automatic re-enrollment provisions, cost-sharing reductions for states related to abortion care, marketplace eligibility changes for lawfully present immigrants, and verification policies that would eliminate passive re-enrollment and conditional eligibility for Marketplace assistance. If each of these provisions were to go into effect, they estimate the individual market enrollment could drop by up to 57% in 2026, leaving between 10 and 12.5 million enrollees remaining in the marketplace. Those who do remain would likely see a substantial increase in their premiums due to more healthy participants leaving the pool and an increased rate of morbidity.
Wakely’s analysis does not account for other factors that could reasonably be expected to change marketplace coverage, including limitations on Medicaid provider taxes, which may reduce access to Medicaid and drive consumers to the health care exchanges, increasing the number of people impacted.
This picture is evolving rapidly. On Thursday, June 26th, several of these harmful provisions hit procedural roadblocks in the Senate when the parliamentarian ruled they violated the Senate Byrd rules, which allow senators to block legislation from the reconciliation process if it would significantly increase the federal deficit beyond a ten-year term or is otherwise considered policymaking not related to fiscal matters.
The Senate Finance Committee is expected to revisit these sections to try to make them compliant with the Byrd rules. Congressional leadership’s ability to pass their desired tax cuts for the wealthy hinges on their making these cuts to Medicaid and SNAP.
25%
On Tuesday, U.S. Senator Mazie K. Hirono (D-HI) convened a group of lawmakers in a hearing to draw attention to a provision of the reconciliation package that for the very first time would create a federal voucher-like scholarship tax credit to subsidize private school education. The tax credit for donations to private scholarship granting organizations would be 100% for donations of cash or stock, an unprecedented incentive in the federal tax code with nearly three times the incentive for all other charitable giving.
Several testifiers highlighted comprehensive longitudinal research from Iowa, where Princeton University researchers identified an almost-immediate 25% increase in private school tuition after tax incentive programs were implemented. Iowans experienced the sharpest increases at the kindergarten level, where voucher eligibility was universal, with tuition costs hiked 21-25%. However, the study did not see any tuition increases at all in pre-K programs, which were ineligible for incentives. Testifiers shared that these increases often make private schools unaffordable for low-income families that voucher programs purport to help, even when they do receive voucher or scholarship assistance.
In November 2024, 508,140 Nebraskans voted to repeal LB 1402, passed by the Nebraska Legislature months prior, a resounding rebuke of public funding for private education across the state. This was a greater number of votes than were received by nearly the entire federal delegation.